Fate Without Destiny
by ladidai
Summary: There is a subtle distinction between fate and destiny in Chinese culture. Fate will bring two people together, but they may not end up connected. It is only when they are destined do they find happiness together.
1. Chapter 1

"You yuan wu fen" ancient Chinese proverb meaning to have fate without destiny

XXX

"Welcome to Patton Boggs, Michael."

"Thank you," Mike said as he shook the hand of the pleasant, plump lady who worked in HR.

"We should be the ones thanking you. No one at the firm expected you to move from LA to join us."

Mike shrugged. "I wasn't really expecting to take this offer either, but things change."

"Well, I'm sure you'll love it here," she said as she pulled out a folder from her desk drawer and handed it to Mike. "Here's your welcome packet. Some of the paperwork needs to be finished today. Make sure you get that back to me before you leave."

Mike nodded and said, "Sounds good."

The plump, pleasant HR lady picked up her phone and pushed a button. "Heather, it's me. I'm all done with Michael. You're up." She hung up the phone. "Any questions while we wait?"

"Was there a reason the firm wanted me specifically?"

"I'm sorry, I can't answer that. I'm just handling your final paperwork." She tucked her pen back into a cup with the firm's name on it. "I'm sure the associate you're working with can answer that."

"Right, of course."

"Any other questions?"

A knock on the door stopped Mike from saying he didn't.

The pleasant, plump HR lady gestured towards Mike. "Heather, this is Michael. He's your new policy analyst."

Mike turned around in his seat and looked at the newcomer, a pretty brunette who had a face that said she graduated from college a week ago. The perfectly tailored suit, expensive jewelry, and the way she carried herself said otherwise. The fact she left her suit jacket unbuttoned said something completely different.

"Hi, I'm Heather," she said with her hand extended. "Gonna be working as an analyst with James?"

Mike took her hand and shook it. "Yea. That's right."

"Same here," Heather said with a smile. "Welcome to the team."

"Team?"

"We do things a little differently around here." Heather looked at the HR lady and said, "You guys all done here?" to which the HR lady nodded. Heather looked back at Mike and gestured towards the door. "Come on. I'll show you around."

The elevator made them wait which Mike didn't mind because it gave him time to think. New environments and situations always made him want to think and even less talkative. Not that there was much to think about since it was his first day and all the work he had was to fill out his new employee paperwork.

"So, not much of a talker are you?"

"Not really." Mike grinned. "What gave it away?"

She grinned back. "Guys usually flirt with me the second they see me."

"Sorry, I haven't offended you have I?"

"Depends." She raised an eyebrow. "Are you gay?"

"Heh," Mike said as he shook his head. "No, I'm not."

"Then I'm a little offended." She looked over as the elevator doors opened and she walked in. "Don't worry; you can make it up to me later."

He followed her into the elevator. "Ah…"

She smiled and touched his arm. "Don't be nervous. I don't bite."

Mike glanced over at her with a look that said he was more frightened than he actually was.

"Okay," she said with pursed lips. "That was a bit much."

"Just a little," he said as he held an index finger and thumb half an inch apart to show her just how little it was.

The elevator softly dinged, the doors slid open, and she walked out with Mike following her.

"We're on the ninth floor with the rest of the government accounts." She began gesturing around her as she described how the office was set up, where the essential rooms were, and who worked where. It was your basic office floor, copy room, supply closet, secretary's desk, and employee lounge. Cubicles were stuffed into the center of the area, fitting in as many as possible while still making each one semi-comfortable for its occupant. Offices for more important employees, mostly lawyers, lined the sides of the floor.

She led him to the one of the corners of the floor and stopped. "This is our team's area. No one else is here, so we'll get you introduced when they get in." She pointed at the cubicle against the far wall. "That's yours." She pointed at the cubicle next to his. "That's mine. IT set you up with a login right?"

Mike nodded and he followed her swaying hips as she walked past him and toward her cubicle. The wink and smile she threw at him as she entered it told him that she knew what he was doing. He had nothing better to do, so he went into his sparsely furnished cubicle, took off his suit jacket, and began to work through his new employee paperwork.

The next thing he knew there was a light tapping at the entrance of his cube and a voice he never thought he'd hear again, calling him by a name no one had used in years.

"Mike? Mike Chang?"

He turned around and laid his eyes upon the most beautiful person he'd ever seen in his life. Sure, there were actresses and supermodels that were more beautiful, but in Mike's mind no one he'd seen in person could ever top Quinn Fabray. Especially when she was smiling the way she was as she leaned against the entrance of his cubicle with her arms crossed and dressed in white blouse and grey skirt.

"Quinn?"

Her eyes and smile widened. "It is you."

"And it's you."

"It is me." She tapped the side of his cubicle. "What's with Michael? Did you stop using Mike?"

"Hmm? Oh." He started rocking his seat back and forth. "People just started calling me Michael in college and I didn't care enough to stop them."

"Huh." Her eyes skimmed downward. "Still can't sit still can you?"

He stopped rocking and chuckled. "Can't stop the beat right?"

"What?"

"Don't remember our glee club?"

She pursed her lips. "I try not to think about those times."

"Come on, it wasn't that bad was it?"

She gave him a look which said more to him about her time in high school than words ever could. He could understand why someone wouldn't really want to remember the experiences that made them stronger.

"Right." He took a deep breath and let it out. "So, how long have you worked here?"

"I started here right after I graduated from Yale."

"That's impressive," he said and it showed on his face because it was. Patton Boggs was one of the best legal firms in the United States and consistently ranked among the top lobbying firms in the country. People in the industry would kill to work at Patton Boggs.

"Not really, it was mostly because I interned with Burt every summer. It's easy to make connections at a lobbying firm when you're actually working in Congress."

"Doesn't matter." He raised his arms and gestured around him. "You don't get awesome cubicle like this without knowing what you're doing."

"Oh." Her lips quirked up. "So you know what you're doing huh? Cause we're not going to cut you any slack just because you're new here."

"I was talking about you, you know."

"I know, but I don't have an awesome cubicle like this."

"You don't? Where do you work then?"

She turned part way and pointed at the small office in the corner. "That's mine."

He leaned over in his seat to look past her and could see part of the interior of her office. What he could see wasn't much, just a comfortable looking leather chair and a piece of abstract modern art hanging on the wall opposite of the door. "Wait, what'd you do here?"

"Same as you, policy analyst."

"Wait, why do you get an office?"

"For one," she said as held up her index finger. "You're new here." Her middle finger joined the first. "Two, I'm the best analyst in the firm and perks come with that. Three—"

A sheepish smile appeared on Mike's face as Quinn's little speech continued because it was probably the most he'd ever heard her say at one time. And it had something to do with the fact that she sounded just like she did all those years ago in that choir room.

"What?"

"Nothing," he said as he shook his head. "That's just the most I've ever heard you speak."

An eyebrow was raised. "That's funny coming from you."

His mouth flopped open and he waited for the former high school ice queen to continue her onslaught, but all she did was smile. Hearing something, she turned her head slightly then said, "C'mon, I'll introduce you to our fearless leader."

James, their fearless leader of an attorney, he first met through videoconferencing during the interview process and he seemed like a laidback guy. He said as much when Mike meets him in person for the first time and that as long as Mike did a good job and didn't look like a slob at work, everything else didn't really matter. After that quick chat, James sequestered himself in his office to get ready for the half a dozen meetings he had that day. With a grin, Quinn said that this was a common occurrence because they were the best in the business.

Heather introduced herself again, only more formally this time. It wasn't as though Mike thought she wasn't qualified for what she did, but he had never run into anything like her at any of his previous jobs. Still, he was a bit surprised to find out that she graduated from the top one percent from her class in Georgetown. It wasn't surprising at all to find out she was president of the only sorority at the school.

Neither Quinn nor Mike mentioned that they knew each other from high school to anyone else. Mike didn't care if anyone from work found out about it but he wasn't going to go around telling people for no reason because that piece of information wasn't really important. He assumed Quinn didn't tell anyone because she had things she wanted to keep to herself, so that gave him another reason for him to keep quiet. Not that he ever had a problem doing that.

"Any questions?" Quinn asked as they walked back.

"No." They reached his cubicle. "Wait, what do I do after I finish my HR paperwork?"

"Come get me. I'll find something for you to do."

He gave her a confused look because he was pretty sure James was his boss. Not to mention it seemed like she was flirting with him, but that was just crazy.

She rolled her eyes and pointed her thumb at herself. "Remember those perks I was telling you about for being the best? I basically get to boss you around until James thinks you can work on your own."

"Seriously?"

"Don't worry." She smiled. "I'll take care of you."

He didn't really know how to respond to that.

"Just don't screw up too badly. I'd hate to have to tell James you can't cut it here."

He grinned. "I won't."

"I know you won't." She turned to head into her office, but before she stepped inside, she looked back and said, "We could always count on you."

He looked down, a bit embarrassed, because he never imagined that Quinn Fabray would ever be complimenting him. However, he decided that he was too damn old to be embarrassed about a pretty woman complimenting him, even if it was Quinn Fabray. So he raised his head and said, "It's good to see you again."

"It's good to see you too."

XXX

The knocking coming from behind distracted Mike from the position paper he was editing in front of him. Unlike a lot of people his age, he preferred to do his reviewing with a pen on actual paper. Something about the feel of a pen gliding across paper felt much more satisfying compared to rearranging electronic bits on an LCD screen. Everyone made a comment about it and the person behind him was no different.

"Didn't think you'd be so old school."

He spun around and found Heather standing at the threshold of his cubicle, grinning at him.

"C'mon it's lunch time. Did you brown bag it or do I get to show you around the area?"

"Uh, I guess you get to show me around." He pointed behind him with his thumb. "Gimmie a few minutes; I need to finish going over this for Quinn first."

She smiled and shook her head then said, "Terrible. Your first day and she's already got you doing her work," before leaving.

He turned around and pulled up the electronic version of the paper so he could copy over the changes he made to the paper. This didn't take long at all. Just because he enjoyed using a pen and paper didn't mean his computer skills were lacking, so it took little time for him to complete his task and email the document back to Quinn.

The door to Quinn's office was left ajar. A quick glance inside told Mike that she was busy working and he wondered what she did for lunch while walking over to Heather's cubicle. He found her not working at all but rather watching videos of cute animals on YouTube.

"I can come back later when you're not busy."

"No way. Cute animals can wait." Heather closed her browser window and stood up. "Let's go. I'm starving."

"So, how's your first day been?" Heather asked as they walked towards the elevator.

"It's been fine. Lots of first day stuff then Quinn gave me that short position paper to look over."

"Liking it so far?"

Mike shrugged. "Not much to dislike."

He fell silent like he usually did, but Heather didn't seem to mind since that let her fill the air with chatter about the food options that were around their downtown building. The way she made it sound, there wasn't much to eat so he started to make plans to bring his own lunch from now on. He was figuring out what to do for food the rest of the week when a thought came to him.

"Hey, what does Quinn do for lunch?"

"Quinn? She usually eats by herself in her office or in the lounge."

"Huh."

"Don't bother. She turns down everyone who's asked her to eat with them."

"Well, can't hurt to try," he said before turning around and heading back to where they came from.

Her door was still ajar and he knocked twice before opening it. Her head rose with a look of annoyance on her face that quickly vanished when she saw who it was.

"Hey, Heather and I are going to lunch. Wanna come?"

"No," she said with a shake of her head. "I've got too much work to do."

"You gonna be able to finish it all today?"

"No, but—"

"No, buts. It'll still be here when we get back."

She pursed her lips and glared at him. For a second, he thought she would turn down the offer, but when her hands dropped down to the keyboard and her fingers hit the keys to lock the computer, he knew he had her.

"When did you become so pushy?" she asked with a smile as she grabbed her purse and stood up. "I'm not sure if I like this new you."

The smile told him she wasn't really serious but he still stumbled over his reply while stumbling backwards out of her office. "I— I'm not. I just thought it'd be nice for you to eat with someone. Heather says you always eat alone."

She arched an eyebrow and he flashbacked to their time in high school which filled him with dread while she followed him out.

"I see Tina's love of gossip rubbed off on you."

This time, he was the one who pursed his lips.

Quinn's hard gaze quickly softened and words tumbled out of her mouth. "I— I didn't mean— I don't even know what—"

"It's alright. It's okay." He let out a breath. "I guess we both have things from high school we don't like to think about."

There was a lull in the conversation before Quinn said, "I won't say anything if you won't." She held out her hand. "Deal?"

He gave her a hand a funny look before shaking it and saying, "Deal. C'mon, let's go get lunch."

XXX

To the amazement of Heather and pretty much everyone else at the office, Quinn began to eat lunch with Mike. She didn't do it every day, but more often than not they spent their lunchtime together. It wasn't as though they talked that much while they ate. Neither one of them had ever been the talkative type so putting the two of them together just led a quiet table with a few small conversations about how their respective days were going.

Mike had learned a long time ago at his first job that a professional workplace was not that different from high school so he wasn't surprised that gossip about him and Quinn had started. When he mentioned it to Quinn, she said that she no longer cared about what people thought about her. That had been the trend during their senior year but in Mike's mind it was still high school and everyone thought about their public image no matter what they said or how they acted, even him.

He liked to think that he was above the gossip, but the rumors started to rub him the wrong way when they became about how quickly Quinn started to sleep with the new guy. Thinking that Heather would be someone who could stop them, he told her that he went to high school with Quinn and it was nice of Quinn to eat with him because she was a friendly face. His reasoning proved to be correct when the rumors about them died that same day.

He knew she knew what he did when the first words out of her mouth during lunch were, "I heard what you did today."

"Yea? I didn't think my first assignment from James would be that easy," he said as he played stupid.

"Mike."

"Quinn."

She rolled her eyes and pulled out a Tupperware container filled with salad from her lunch bag. It amazed him that all she ever ate at work was salad and some grilled chicken.

"You didn't have to do it. I told you I didn't care what people said about me."

He fished out his bacon cheeseburger from a paper bag from what had quickly become his restaurant of choice then ripped open said bag for easier access to his fries and poured ketchup over them.

"I know you did, but the rumors weren't just about you."

She arched an eyebrow. "Didn't want to be associated with someone who slept with the new guy before his first week was up?"

"You know I never cared about that," he said before he stuffed a few ketchup covered fries into his mouth.

"Then why tell Heather that we went to high school together?"

He swallowed the food in his mouth. "Because you aren't someone who sleeps with the new guy."

She dropped her gaze and poked at her salad with a fork. "I always forget how nice you were— are. How nice you are."

While she poked away, he ate a few more fries and thought it was crazy that Quinn didn't care if everyone in the firm thought she slept around. And from the way she looked right now, he would've bet that she did care.

"Plus, I didn't want to be known as the new guy who slept around."

Her head shot up and for a second he thought that she might have taken him seriously until a grin appeared on her face. They spent the rest of lunch chatting about Mike's work, with Quinn giving him suggestions on how to improve his writing. He gladly took her advice because she'd been at this job and in the industry much longer than he had and he was always one to know his weaknesses.

Eventually, he noticed that she glanced at his bag of fries one too many times and said, "You can steal one if you want."

"Steal what?"

"A fry. You keep looking at them."

"No, I don't—"

"Go ahead." He pushed the bag closer to her. "I know I'd be bored after a week of salad and grilled chicken."

She smiled and stole the first of many fries.

XXX

It was interesting to Mike to see the differences that Quinn had with her high school self as he sat down in the chair she was gesturing towards.

They were celebrating his successful first week of work at a restaurant with some of her friends. It was strange to see that no one from work was there aside from him, but it didn't surprise him since she didn't talk to the people at work about her personal life. To be honest, he didn't know if he was included in that group since they only talked about job related things during work, so he was happy when Quinn practically ordered him to come have drinks and dinner with her and her friends Friday after work.

As he listened to the conversations around the table, he liked that this version of Quinn was more involved, but he couldn't shake the feeling that he had seen this before. Apparently, Quinn and her friends were regulars at this restaurant since the chef kept coming out with small dishes for them to try. He finally figured out what his subconscious was trying to tell him as the chef brought out yet another dish for the table to try out and one of Quinn's friends was telling some amusing anecdote about someone they knew. Everyone else at the restaurant was looking at their table and he realized that this was just like high school. She was still the head of the group that everyone wanted to a part of.

He used to see Quinn and the Cheerios plant themselves on the bleachers while they watched football practice. Normally, this wouldn't have been a memorable thing, but it was always strange that they sat in a triangle formation. As Head Cheerio, Quinn sat alone at the top row, forcing everyone else to look up at her as she held court. Her best friends, Santana and Brittany sat on the row just below and all the other Cheerios sat in whatever order they were supposed to be in that day.

Now, Quinn was holding court again.

XXX

"Hey, you wanna grab a drink after work?" Quinn asked as she poked her head into his cubicle one Friday afternoon.

"Uh, yea sure."

He thought that Quinn might be flirting with him, but he was awful at reading signals from members of the opposite sex. That had made for plenty of awkward moments during his early college years. His skills gradually became better but he wouldn't say he was actually any good at it, probably a smidge better than mediocre now. Not that going from awful to mediocre was all that helpful.

It turns out he was wrong when she introduces him to her boyfriend, Andrew, at the bar they go to after work. One of Quinn's friends he met at dinner last week was there also, but he doesn't give it much thought because it was nice to unwind over drinks after a week of work. Soon, the table was filled with conversation and even he and Quinn were forced to talk more than they normally do since there were only four at the table.

Naturally, he spent a bit more time talking with Quinn's friend since the other pair at the table had a reason to talk to each other. Not that he minded because she turned out to be pleasant enough to talk with and was easy on the eyes. So the four of them drank the night away while making small talk.

"Andrew's a doctor doing his residency in internal medicine," Quinn said when he went off to the restroom.

"Couldn't wait to brag about that, could you?"

The look Quinn shot him could've frozen a large body of water.

He grinned back and said, "So, how'd you guys meet?"

"We were on the train and he tapped me on the shoulder and whispered some pickup line into my ear."

"Must've been a good line."

"I don't remember," she said with a shrug. "I freaked out and got off at the next stop. He chased after me and well," she shrugged again, "here we are a year and a half later."

Quinn's friend excused herself to go to the restroom and, when she got out of earshot, Quinn said, "Sorry for dragging you out here."

"Don't worry about it. Not like I had anything better to do."

"She's pretty, isn't she?" Quinn asked with a glance towards the restrooms.

Mike nodded and followed her glance with his own eyes.

"She practically begged me to do this."

With a laugh, he looked back at her and said, "Look at you playing matchmaker."

"Don't be ridiculous," Quinn said as she rolled her eyes. "I didn't promise her that you'd actually go out on a date."

Mike gestured around him. "So what'd you call this?"

"This is just four friends getting a drink together." Her hand covered his, causing him to glance down for a second, and her voice lost its playfulness when she said, "I'm serious. Don't think you have to date her."

Quinn looked down and it took a second before she pulled her hand away. When her gaze returned to him, she smiled and he said, "She seems nice enough. Maybe I will ask her out."

"Good. I'm sure she'll be happy."

XXX

They were at their bi-weekly status meeting with James going over their current assignments. Heather and Mike got through their stuff quickly. Quinn outlined the things she was working on and it looked as though it was going to be another fast meeting.

"Lastly—"

"Wait," James said. "Go back to what you just said."

Quinn looked down at her papers. "The public parks thing?"

"Yes. Can you get it done any sooner?"

"There are some bigger accounts that are more pressing."

"I'd like to have it done to get the environmentalists off our back. Mike," James said as he looked down at his notes, "write up the position paper for the corn subsidy legislation."

Out of the corner of his eye, Mike could see Quinn's head jerk toward him because that was one of her major assignments. It wasn't glamorous but it was something she was looking forward to writing because the issues and arguments were complex. She'd said as much during a few of their conversations over lunch.

"Um, I'm not sure I know enough about the issue."

"I've read your papers, you'll be fine. This'll be your primary assignment." James wrote a little note. "Quinn, I think you had one last thing?"

The last item took barely took her a minute to get through and the meeting was over, though for once, Mike wasn't sure he wanted the meeting to be finished. He had a feeling there was a reckoning coming and was proven right from the look he got from Quinn as they walked back. The feeling was even worse when Quinn basically stopped talking to him over something he had no control over.

XXX

It was a random Saturday night when Quinn stopped by.

She said she was in the neighborhood and decided on a whim to see if he was home. He wasn't sure if she was lying, but he was pretty sure she knew he was there. The only people who he knew in the city were from work or her friends and she was always there when he hung out with either group. His only other option was going out on another date with Quinn's friend but after a few dates, he wasn't in a rush to go out on another and he didn't think she was either.

Holding a bottle of Malbec and two glasses, he walked back from the kitchen and found her sitting primly on the couch with her hands and legs crossed. With the nice dress she had on, he wondered what her original plans for the night were.

"Thank you," she said when he handed her a glass. It amused him to see her hold the glass by the stem and swirl the liquid inside before sniffing it a few times. Only after all that did she take a sip and smile.

"Any reason you're staring at me?" she asked since he had been staring at her through the entire process.

"This stuff isn't that expensive," he said as he held his own glass, cupping the bowl with the palm of his hand. "You didn't really need to go through all that."

"And you really shouldn't be holding your glass like that. Your hand is going to warm the wine."

He chuckled then said, "I didn't know you were a sommelier."

The glare she gave him reminded him of the ones she used to give out back in high school and it made him nervous out of some Pavlovian response he learned from back then. He went back to wondering why she stopped by as he stared ahead. Most of their conversations were work related even though she was the person he saw the most outside of work because they were both still pretty quiet so they usually listened to the stories her friends told.

After a few sips of his wine, he turned his head and found her looking around.

"So, um—"

"I like your apartment," she said, still looking around between sips of her own.

"It's not much." And it really isn't. The place is pretty small and all his furniture is cheap stuff from Ikea. He's always been pretty messy and this place was no different, so there were piles of his things everywhere.

"It's comfortable," she said before looking at him, "like a home should be."

"Thanks?"

She went back to looking around and the conversation died. The silence started to bug him so he turned on the TV which drew her attention.

"What're we watching?"

"Don't know. See if anything is on; if not, I've got Netflix." He sipped on his wine. "Any preferences?"

"No sports. No reality shows, unless it's Top Chef," she said with a tone that told him that he had better pay attention to her.

He surfed around for a while until he found a channel that just started to play Star Trek, the J.J. Abrams version, and Quinn stopped him, commenting that she loved the movie and its sequels. Chuckles came out of him because he found it amusing that she would like those movies until she looked over at him which quickly shut him up.

Every once in a while Mike glanced over at her during the movie and every time he does, she was still primly sitting in the exact same position as when he first saw her. The only things she did were play with her charm bracelet on her right wrist and recross her legs every once in a while. For someone who said they liked the movie, she sure didn't react to it like someone who did. At the very least, he figured that the stuff with Scotty would make her laugh because Simon Pegg is a funny dude, but when he looked over all she had was a smile on her face. Well, it was better than nothing.

Meanwhile, his lanky arms and legs are sprawled all over the rest of the couch and constantly shifting around because that's how he's always been. He's happy that she doesn't seem to mind it, even when his foot accidentally bumps into her a few times.

The bottle of wine was almost finished when the credits began to roll. Quinn checked her watch and stood up. A little unsteadily, Mike scrambled up to his feet to join her.

"Thanks for having me over," she said like he had actually invited her over, but whatever.

"Thanks for coming over."

She picked up her handbag and started to make her way to the door.

"Quinn."

She turned around.

"Is everything alright?" I meant you just stopped by…"

A smile appeared on her face. "Everything's fine. Andrew got called in to work a double shift, again and, like I said, I was in the neighborhood."

"Oh."

"Thanks again," she said before beginning to walk away again.

"Quinn."

She turned around again.

"Do you want me to walk you home?"

She looked at him wobbling and smiled. "No, I'll be okay. It's not that late and I don't live too far away."

"You sure?"

"Yea, because I'd probably have to walk you back after you escorted me to my place," she said before heading towards the door again.

"Quinn."

She turned around again and, by the tightness of her smile, he saw that she was starting to get annoyed.

"Bring the wine next time."

Her smile widened until it reached her eyes and she said, "I will."

And she did.


	2. Chapter 2

They started to refer to the times Quinn dropped by as movie nights, even if they didn't watch a movie. TV shows and movies always told him that doctors had long, hard hours but it still kind of surprised him that she dropped by so often. Very rarely did she come dressed up like she did that first time. Most nights, it was just a pair of jeans and a t-shirt or a casual dress or, like tonight, a simple skirt and blouse. The smile on her face and the laughter she brought to his place made him not mind the frequency of her visits.

"We're finishing Lord of the Rings tonight, right?" Quinn asked as she walked back from his kitchen with a half-full bottle of pinot noir, two glasses, and a bag of Smartfood Popcorn.

He probably should have thought something other than it was awesome that he didn't have to get up now that Quinn knew where pretty much everything in his place was.

"Yea, get ready for four hours of orc killing goodness," he said as he poured a glass of wine for each of them while she took a seat next to him.

"I still can't believe that they made a four hour version of each movie."

As the movie started and the story of how the One Ring was found again was shown, he said, "Still can't believe that you like these kind of movies."

"What? I can't like them or something?"

"It's just that I never saw you liking all these sci-fi/fantasy things." He turned up the volume a little bit and smacked her leg with the remote. "Very nerdy of you."

She hit him back. "Says the guy who owns all of them on Blu-ray." And because she just had to do him one better, she hit him again. "And what made you think I wouldn't like nerdy things?"

"You know, you were a cheerleader and everything…"

"Didn't think you'd be judging me."

For a second, Mike thought he had hurt her feelings but she grinned and just hit him again and he knew she was fine. It made him glad because she had become visibly more open in her reaction to the movies and shows they watched and he didn't want that to stop because of some stupid comment. Those little reactions quickly became his favorite part of movie night.

Tonight was no different, as he glanced at her every so often, this is what he saw: Shimmering eyes as Pippin sang his song to King Denethor. A wistful look as Éowyn confessed her unrequited love to Aragorn. Grins bordering on wicked as Aragorn led the Army of the Dead against Sauron's forces and the Eye of Sauron fell. Tears rolled down her cheeks as every man bowed to the four hobbits.

That last thing caused him to grin and smack her in the leg with the remote again. Without looking, she hit him back half a dozen times, each one harder than the last until he slid across the couch so she couldn't reach him. That didn't stop a pillow from being thrown his way.

"Well, that was twelve hours of amazing," she said as Sam finally returned to his wife and children in the Shire.

"It was."

"I really should get a Blu-ray player. Things look amazing on it," she said before stretching her arms, leaning over, and kicking him in the leg.

"What was that for?"

"That was for making fun of me."

"When did I make fun of you?"

"You know when. And don't think I didn't hear you sniffling over there while I was crying over here."

"What about those times you hit me in the arm? And I plead the fifth about the sniffling."

She rolled her eyes. "That was for hitting me with the remote."

"Want me to walk you home?"

It wasn't often that she took him up on this offer, but every once in a while she let him tag along. Surprisingly, her apartment was a couple of blocks down the street from his. The only difference with hers was that it was a brand new building filled with high-end, modern condos. His was a much older building with a heating system that barely worked, which he found out about when he moved in near the end of winter.

"No, I'm okay. I'm just glad I caught you here tonight." she said before she yawned, arched her back, and stretched again. "It's annoying when I drop by and you're not here."

"What?" He turned his head and found a look of panic on her face that quickly disappeared.

"Nothing," she said much too quickly as she looked away.

"How many times have you come by and not found me?"

In reply, all she did was purse her lips.

"Quinn," he said, trying to sound stern which never really worked for him.

"Mike."

"How many times have I not been here?"

She dropped her head and, after a few seconds, said, "A few."

"How many times is a few?"

"Less than ten, more than five?"

He couldn't believe that she had dropped by that many times. He knew that Andrew was a doctor doing his residency and that meant 60 hour work weeks, but the amount of times Quinn dropped by was ridiculous. It wasn't exactly his place to say anything though.

"You could call me."

"No, it's not a big deal," she said as she shook her head. "I don't want this to become some sort of… planned thing."

"We don't have to plan these nights. Just call or text before so you don't waste a trip."

She stared at him for a moment before looking away again. "Can I send you a quick text before I come over?"

If he didn't think this was such a serious situation, he would have laughed at the question. Instead, he said, "Of course you can."

XXX

The first time she texted him he had no idea what it was about because all she sent was _i/o?_

_What?_

_Are you in or out?"_

_I'm in. Come over._

The first time he told her he was out he thought nothing of it. The third time he sent "_out_" back to her he felt bad. The fifth time he had to do it he was at a bar with a few friends and it sucked all of the fun out of the bar for him.

XXX

One summer night when she dropped by, she was carrying a small pink box which was strange since all she usually ever brought was a bottle of wine as a replacement for one of his that they had drained some previous night.

She set it down on the little kitchen table where he ate breakfast and dinner then headed straight for his little wine rack. A bottle of red was pulled out and the label was considered for a few seconds before she placed it on the counter and headed to the fridge. From there, she pulled out a jug of milk and filled two tall glasses with the 2% he drank. She brought them back to his table and put one down at each end and sat down by the side closest to the living room.

"Can you get two plates?"

Standing by the kitchen, he had been watching her go through all of this with an amused smirk on his face and didn't move.

"Please?"

"What's in the box?" he asked after he grabbed the requested items and took his seat.

"Do you know what date it is?"

"June 8th… I think?"

She pulled the box closer to her, opened it, and said, "That's right."

"What's so important about today?"

Two chocolate cupcakes with mounds of frosting and a sprinkling of sprinkles on top were pulled from the box and one was placed on each plate.

Noting the logo on top of the box he said, "These are from Georgetown Cupcake."

"They are."

If Mike could, he would've arched an eyebrow. "You waited two hours in line for two cupcakes? Today must be important."

"It is. And it was only one hour," Quinn said before clasping her hands and bowing her head. It wasn't something she did very often, but she did it enough for Mike to know that he should bow his head as well.

After half a minute he heard her say, "It's Beth's birthday."

His head shot up and he found her staring at him. "I— What?"

"She's fourteen today."

"Quinn…"

"I'm sorry for springing this on you. I just—"

"No, it's fine, but shouldn't you be with Andrew?"

"He doesn't know."

He opened his mouth to say something, but she cut him off.

"It's not that I'm embarrassed about it or anything. I just never got around to telling him and now I don't really know how to."

"I'm sure he won't care and he'd be glad you shared this with him."

She drank some milk.

"What about Puck?"

"What about him?"

"You talk to him today?"

"No," she said while playing with the lip of her glass. "After our last breakup we decided that it'd be best if we didn't talk again."

"Oh." He took a drink of milk, which was kind of weird to have this late, even if they were having cupcakes. "Do you ever talk with uh…"

"Shelby?" He nodded. "Yea, I called her before I came over."

"What about Beth?"

She shook her head and said, "No."

"Are you going to?"

"Maybe," she said with a shrug. "Shelby said she wouldn't mind and Beth already knows me as her Aunt Quinn."

"Aunt Quinn?" he asked with a grin.

"I send her a birthday gift every year so I get to be an aunt."

"What'd you get her this year?"

"A Fender guitar." She grinned. "Shelby says she'll ship Beth out here if she makes too much noise."

They laughed then stared at their respective cupcakes for a moment before he said, "Why'd you come over tonight?"

"I don't know. I usually spend this night alone but I didn't feel like it tonight and you knew about Beth so I guess I thought… I hope this isn't too awkward for you."

"Just a little," he said as he grinned and held up his thumb and index finger slightly apart. "But it's fine. If you can't make things awkward for your friends then who can you make 'em awkward for?"

It made him glad that the edges of her lips lifted in a small smile at his stupid comment because it wasn't one that she used out in public and rarely used in private. That smile vanished right before her throat constricted in a swallow.

"Shelby says Beth's been asking about her birth mother." _This_ wasn't what the night or the conversation that Mike had signed up for but, like he said, this was what friends were for. "She said it was up to me."

His finger poked at the paper lining surrounding the cupcake as he tried to gather his thoughts. It didn't seem like Quinn minded that he was taking his time as she played around with her glass of milk.

"I'm not gonna presume that you need, or even want, my advice so I'm not going to give it to you, not that I have any. I just want you to know that I'll be here with all my geeky movies and TV shows if you need them."

The small smile reappeared on her face. "Thanks."

"But seriously, what can I do to help?"

"I don't really know." She took a sip of her milk before continuing with a bigger smile. "But, you're doing a pretty good job."

He picked up his cupcake and saluted her with it. "To Beth."

After a moment, she returned the salute. "To Beth."

The cupcakes were delicious.

XXX

As with all writers, there were moments when Mike sat in front of a half-finished paragraph, stumped and not knowing what to write next. This was one of those moments.

He looked at the last sentence he wrote for this paper that he no longer wanted to think about. So he didn't. His head dropped back against the headrest of his chair and, after blindly flailing his hand around for the volume control on his iPod, he let thoughts be drowned out by the music coming from his headphones. Annoyingly, his cocoon of sound didn't last very long since someone plucked them away from his ears.

"I've called your name like five times already," Heather said after he spun around.

"Uh…"

"What're you listening to anyway?" she asked as she brought the headphones up to her right ear and smiled. "Taylor Swift? My God, I remember listening to her back in high school and loving it." Her head began gently bobbing. "I still love her music."

"They say you'll always love the music you listened to in high school," he said with a shrug.

"I can't believe you listened to her in the first place."

"What? She's was pretty good."

Heather smirked at him then tossed him his headphones and said, "C'mon, you're not doing any work; let's grab a snack."

He looked back at his document and still had no idea what to write next. With a sigh, he saved what he had written and stood up.

"That's the spirit."

They walked towards the elevators and he said, "I don't see how you get any work done around here."

"Oh, that's what Quinn is for. All she does is work." She wrapped an arm around one of his and hugged it. "Now, what'd you want to eat?"

"Dunno. Not really hungry, but I could use something to drink."

"I'm guessing you don't mean alcohol," she said as she pulled him closer.

He chuckled and shook his head.

"CVS it is then."

Mike let her chatter away about office gossip as they waited for the elevator. He couldn't care less about who was dating or hating whom or how some secretary had stabbed the receptionist the back, but Heather never liked talking about actual work and they didn't have anything else in common. So office gossip it was.

The elevator dinged and the doors slid open. Quinn, along with some attorney from the office, stepped out and paused in front of Mike and Heather. The latter let go of Mike's arm and took a small step away from him.

"Hey, we're going to CVS." Mike said. "Wanna come?"

Quinn's eyes darted from Heather to Mike before she said, "No, I've got work."

"Want me to bring you back something?"

Her eyes glanced back to Heather. "No."

"You sure?"

Quinn rolled her eyes. "Fine. An Arizona Arnold Palmer."

Mike grinned and stepped aside to let the other pair pass. "You got it."

The elevator ride began with blissful silence but that was quickly shattered as Heather resumed her one-sided conversation on office gossip. Thankfully, they didn't have to stop at any other floors so the ride was short. Although, if someone else did get on the elevator Heather might have stopped talking. A real catch-22.

"Thanks for listening to me ramble," Heather said as they exited the building. "I know you don't care about all the gossip but it helps me unwind."

Mike chuckled. "No problem. You can talk my ear off all you want. Just don't expect me to have an opinion on that stuff. Or remember any of it."

"Noted, but I think you'll want to pay attention to this juicy bit of news."

"Hmm?"

"You know that lawyer we saw with Quinn?"

"What about him."

She looked around, grabbed his arm, and pulled him closer to whisper into his ear. "He's got a big ol' crush on her."

"Does he now?"

"He does. And I hear he was none too happy that you were the chosen one when it came to her lunchtime companion."

He sighed and said, "Does he know that I'm her friend from high school. And that she has a boyfriend?"

She grinned up at him. "Yes and yes, but when has that ever stopped anyone from being jealous?"

"Never, I suppose," he said after considering her statement for a second.

XXX

Heather's statement didn't really hit home until later on that day.

Quinn had texted him right as he walked into his apartment with her usual "_i/o?_" and he told her to come on over. He did have plans to meet up at a bar with some people from work, but those were easily and quickly canceled with a text. It didn't require a second thought from him because he had a much better time watching movies and TV shows with her than drinking beer with a bunch of people he didn't really know.

As usual, there were piles of his stuff all around his apartment so he spent some time cleaning up because Quinn had made one too many comments about the mess. He knew she wouldn't come right out and say it, but the mess bothered her and those comments were her way of expressing it. Whether his place was clean or messy didn't matter to him but he usually didn't feel like cleaning after work or on the weekends or any time really. But if it bothered Quinn that much that she had to comment about it every time she came over then he'd spend a little time cleaning up beforehand.

He had just finished dropping off a load of crap into his bedroom when he heard the notification sound for a new text message. That was ignored because he had to wash some dishes in the sink that had been there for a few days. When that was done he checked his phone and saw that the text was from Quinn.

_Won't be able to make it tonight. Andrew is surprising me with a night out._

_No worries. Have fun._

He stared at the text message from Quinn and felt way more disappointed than he thought he would.

XXX

"Mike," he heard Quinn say after she knocked on the wall of his cubicle, "you doing anything Friday night?"

He tried to remember if he had any plans for tomorrow night and came up with nothing. "Nope."

"Can I come over?"

This was new. She had never asked him if he had plans before coming over. It had always been that quick text message.

"Uh, sure."

"I want pizza for dinner."

"Uh, okay."

"Great. I'll see you then."

XXX

The pizza arrived minutes after Quinn did on Friday night and she grabbed a slice from the box before he had a chance to put it on the table.

"Hungry much?"

She ignored him and poured herself an extra full glass of wine before taking a seat on the couch. It didn't take her long to finish her first slice and demand that Mike bring her another, which he did before getting his own dinner ready.

Back to the Future was the feature presentation for the night and when they both said Doc Brown's iconic line about not needing roads with the character onscreen, they looked at each other and laughed.

Quinn drained what was left of her wine and curled up against the armrest opposite of him. It took her a bit of flailing to grab the remote so she could channel surf. He finished his own wine and looked over to find her staring at him. It didn't take long until he started to feel self-conscious so he picked up the now empty wine bottle and glasses and brought them to the kitchen.

"Thanks for tonight," she said when he sat back down. "I really needed it."

"Well, I'm glad I could help."

He heard her shifting in her seat and when he looked over she was sitting up again, still staring at the TV.

"You remember that night I had to cancel on you?"

"What about it?"

"Andrew and I got into a fight." She changed the channel. "I— I think we're finished."

"What happened?" he asked after a few seconds.

"He surprised me with dinner at a nice place."

"Sounds romantic."

"It was. Then he asked me to move in with him."

"Oh."

"I told him that I needed to think about it and that he shouldn't have surprised me like that."

"Sounds reasonable."

"Maybe it is. Maybe it isn't. All I know is that we got into an argument and I have no idea how it happened no matter how many times I go over that night."

It was few more seconds before he asked, "Do you want to move in with him?"

"No. Yes." She sighed. "I don't know. This is a huge decision and he just sprung it on me like it was some sort of weekend getaway." Another sigh. "How could he do this to me?"

To buy himself some time, he licked his lips and swallowed. "I think that he thought that this would be a surprise that you'd be happy about. I've seen you two together and you guys have always looked happy." He heard nothing but the sounds from the TV so he continued talking. "How long have you guys been together?"

"Almost two years."

"And he does make you happy right?"

"He does."

"Then you should probably talk to him. I'm sure you guys can work this out."

Before excusing herself for the night, she said, "I'm sure we can."

XXX

It wasn't until Sunday afternoon that he heard from her again and even then it was only a single text.

_It's over._

XXX

Quinn spoke even less than usual the following work week and not even Heather's extensive gossip network could figure out why. That meant Heather had bugged him every day trying to see if he knew what was going on with Quinn. Needless to say, he kept his mouth shut. Not that Quinn had spoken much to him either. So it was a bit of a surprise to find she was the one knocking on his door late Saturday afternoon.

"What happened to texting before coming over?"

"What happened to the guy who never talked?" She dropped her head and sighed. "I'm sorry."

He waved her inside and said, "Don't worry about it."

"I need a drink," she said as she walked to the kitchen. "Something stronger than wine if you've got it."

"Single malt scotch work?" he asked, following her to the kitchen.

"I can't believe you've been hiding the good stuff from me after all this time."

He opened a cabinet, pulled out a bottle from the top shelf, and handed it to her. "That good enough for you?"

She examined the label then looked up at him. "Why do you have Macallan 18? Do you have a drinking problem I don't know about?"

He laughed. "No, sometimes you just wanna have something good. A bottle of that lasts about a year for me."

The bottle was handed back to him. "This is perfect."

"How do you take it?"

"Straight, please."

"Look at you being all sophisticated," he said as he pulled two lowball glasses out.

She smiled and said, "Shut up."

With a smile of his own, he poured two fingers of the brown liquid into each glass then handed her one. She quickly drained it then held it out for a refill which he gave her.

"So you savor the cheap wine but not my expensive scotch?"

"C'mon," she said as she rolled her eyes and left the kitchen. "Bring the bottle."

It didn't usually take them very long to settle on a movie. They had done this enough times before to know each other's tastes and could always find something they both liked. Tonight was different though, Mike didn't say a word while Quinn took her time browsing with the remote in one hand and her drink in the other.

After about five minutes of her endlessly scrolling through Netflix, he said, "You have any idea what you wanna watch?"

Her head jerked up like he had startled her. "Sorry. I kinda zoned out."

"It's okay."

"Do you want to pick something?"

"No, take your time," he said as she went back to her scrolling.

It didn't take too long for Quinn to speak again.

"I haven't thought about him since Monday and I'm completely fine with it. And with us being over. What does that say about me?"

He barely got "Uh…" out of his mouth before she continued to talk.

"I couldn't have loved him if I don't care at all, right?"

"Uh…"

"But then staying with him for almost two years would've been a complete waste of time."

"I'm sure you have some good memories of your time together."

She exhaled loudly. "Yea, that's true."

"And I'm sure it wasn't a waste of time because the Quinn I know wouldn't have put up with that."

She exhaled again but said nothing this time. Instead, she picked up her drink and sipped. But it wasn't long until she spoke again.

"I did some soul searching during the week and I don't know why I keep ruining my relationships. I've been doing it since high school and I haven't stopped." She paused to take a deep breath and her voice quivered as she said, "There's something wrong with me, isn't there?

"God. This is ridiculous," she said as she wiped at her eyes. "I haven't cried all week and now I'm doing it in front of you."

He slid across the couch, put his arm around her shoulder, and pulled her closer. It was a bit of a surprise when she wrapped her arms around him after a few seconds and cried into his chest. The fact that she cried silently and with little movement wasn't a surprise.

"There's nothing wrong with you. No one gets it right, until they get it right. Everything before that is just progress."

"If I knew they make their graduates so wise, I would've gone to Stanford instead of Yale."

He chuckled then said, "Don't beat yourself up because you're like the rest of us. We've all gotten it wrong sometimes. And I didn't learn that from Stanford."

It took a few seconds before she looked up at him and said, "You and Tina were never like the rest of us."

Mike laughed, but Quinn shook her head and said, "It's true. While everyone else was always dealing with their drama, you two were together and happy all through high school. If I wasn't stuck in my relationships like I was in a revolving door, I think I would've been jealous of Tina."

"The most popular girl in school jealous of the once-stuttering gothy girl?" He chuckled and shook his head. "Crazy."

"It's not crazy. I wish… I wish I had what you guys had."

"No you don't," he mumbled and immediately hoped she hadn't heard the words.

No such luck.

"What'd you mean?"

"Nothing. It's not important."

"You're lying."

"Quite possibly."

"Fine. Don't tell me," she said as she dug her elbow into his ribs and tried to slide away.

"Nice to know all I need to do to get you to stop crying is make you mad."

Her shoulders rolled his arm off and she began to shift away from him. The way her mood could shift so suddenly would always surprise and amuse him, even if it meant being given the cold shoulder every once in a while. But most of all, he was honored because it meant she was comfortable enough with him to actually show emotions rather than the casual indifference she presented to everyone else. Though that didn't mean he liked it when she gave him the cold shoulder.

"Fine," he said then let out a sigh. "But you're gonna think I'm an asshole."

That got her attention as she stopped mid-shift and said, "I wouldn't think—"

"Don't say anything until you've heard the story." He took a long look at the remaining bit of the dark amber liquid in his glass before adding refilling it with an extra-long pour. "I'm going to need a new bottle when this night is over."

It didn't take too long to tell the story because most of the details had been forgotten, but that didn't stop Quinn from listening with rapt attention as he told her about the final stages of what became a long distance relationship with Tina and all his shortcomings: the lack of attention, the arguments, and his general awfulness during the last few months.

"So that's how it went through the last few months of my freshman year." He ran a hand through his hair. "Wouldn't exactly make my greatest hits album."

He felt her hand touch his forearm before he heard her say, "Long distance relationships are hard. I'm sure you both did the best you could."

"That's not the worst part," he said as he stared down at her hand. "We tried to fix it that summer after she graduated from McKinley even though I think we both knew things we over. And it was. We broke up right before we went off to college."

"Yea, I kinda remember that. We were all pretty sad when we heard."

"Well it gets better. We slept together one last time before breaking up—In fact, it was the night we broke up—and I get a call from her a few months later and she tells me that she's pregnant."

The gasp from Quinn paused his story for a second.

"Yea, I think I made that same noise when she told me. I mean we talked now and then, but this came out of nowhere because she was on birth control. And you know what?" That feeling of surprise, terror, and joy hit him again, muted through the passage of time, and he looked up at her. "I was fine with it because we were still in love and I told her that. And I told her that the choice was completely up to her, but I would be there for her either way.

"She didn't call for a few weeks, but when she did she said she was going to get an abortion." As soon as that last word left his mouth he felt her hand tighten its grip on his arm. "I— I couldn't believe how relieved I felt."

"That's understandable. It would've been almost impossible to raise a kid at the same time while you guys were basically starting at two different schools."

"I know. That's what she told me but it still made me feel awful but what could I do? It was her choice so we made plans to get it done over Thanksgiving weekend."

The grimace on her face made him put on a wry smile before he said, "Yea, not exactly the best way to spend the holiday weekend."

"I could think of better options."

"Well… we uh, never got around to it. About a week before Thanksgiving, she called me. Only this time she was crying because she had a miscarriage."

Tears reappeared in her eyes as she said, "Mike…"

Seeing as how both of her hands were involved with the death grip being applied to one of his forearms, he used the free hand attached to the other to grab a tissue and held it up to her. He waited until she dabbed her eyes dry before he continued.

"Here's the best part. I was so angry at her. I mean, it's not like it made a difference. The end result was the same, but I couldn't even look at or talk with her over Thanksgiving break. It took months before I could actually think about her without getting angry. I was being fucking ridiculous and I know I hurt her by not being there for her."

"Mike…"

"I never thought I'd be that guy who would hurt someone he loved, you know?"

"You didn't mean to," she said as he finally noticed that her hand had been gently stroking his arm and it seemed like she didn't realize she was doing it either. He didn't say anything about it because, well, it felt good.

"That makes it worse doesn't it? Anyway, that's the story as to why I'm an asshole."

From the silence coming from her, it was pretty clear that she agreed with him. He picked up his glass and took a sip, just to have something to do.

"You would have made a good father."

He laughed then gave her an incredulous look. "Are you kidding me? I didn't even know what I wanted to do with my own life back then. There's no way I could've been a dad."

"That doesn't matter. I know you would've made a good father," she said with a tone that made it sound like she was going over a position paper she had written and was completely certain in its arguments. And like listening to her talk about those papers, he didn't know if she believed in what she was saying, but she sure sounded like she did.

"You would have been a good mother."

"I wasn't ready," she said as she finally pulled her hand away his forearm, much to his disappointment, and picked up her own glass.

Throwing her own words back at her, he said, "That doesn't matter. I know you would've been a good mother."

She smiled softly and rolled her eyes.

He continued, "I'm not kidding."

"Could've fooled me."

It was his turn to roll his eyes, something he didn't do very often. "Out of all of us, you were the most mature."

"Are you sure you know what that word means? Because I think you're forgetting when I turned into a chain-smoking crazy person."

"Forget you with pink hair? Never."

That made her eyes roll again.

"I'm serious. You would have made a great mother, pink hair and all."

"Thanks."

He grinned, nudged her with an elbow, then said, "And you would be a great mother now, even without the pink hair."

XXX

"So, what're we doing tomorrow?"

Mike looked up from his food and found Quinn leaning towards him from across her side of the table.

"Hmm? Don't know."

"There's an exhibit at the Hirshhorn we can go to."

Mike made a face. "Modern art?"

"Yes, modern art," she said as she kicked him in the shin, causing him to grin. "There was this guy who did some really beautiful things with wirework. His stuff was amazing and it's interesting how—"

"Okay okay, we can go to the Hirshhorn. But I get to choose what we're watching tonight."

The look on her face didn't make it seem like she was too thrilled with getting what she wanted before she looked down and stabbed a few pieces of pasta with her fork. Mike spent a few minutes watching Quinn eating in silence until she looked up and spoke again.

"I know I've been coming by here pretty often ever since Andrew and I broke up. I appreciate it, but I know I'm taking up a lot of your free time so just tell me if you need a weekend or two to yourself."

Mike swallowed the pasta in his mouth, looked at her, and said, "If I minded you dropping by, I would tell you. Plus, if you're only going to give me two weekends, there's no point is there?" That earned him a grin and another kick in the shin. "More wine?"

XXX

"Mike, you know I like you right?"

"Hmm?" He glanced up from his work at Heather who was leaning against his desk. "Yea, I kinda figured that with the way you're always grabbing my arm and pulling me around."

"You know it's just as a friend right?"

"I kinda figured that too since you've told me all about your dates."

"Good, as long as we're both clear on that."

"Okay then," he said as he typed a bit. "Glad we cleared that, uh, confusion right up."

"Don't be a jerk."

"Just restating what we've learned like any good conclusion should."

He could feel her eyes rolling as he went back to work, not that he minded since the paper he was writing was simple and she wasn't distracting him by dragging him out of his cubicle for some reason or another.

"Good. Because I wanted to ask you something as a friend."

"Hmm? What's that?"

"How do you think a woman would feel if the guy she liked got back after being away for a few days from say… a wedding and didn't notice that she had gotten her hair done and was wearing nicer clothes just for that guy?"

"She'd probably be pissed— Wait, I just got back from a wedding." He spun around in his chair and looked Heather over. "You don't look any different."

"Not me, you idiot," she said as she kicked his chair.

"Uh, who then?"

"Are you serious?"

"Uh, yes…?" he asked, pretty sure that wasn't the right answer.

She pushed away from his desk and stuck her head out of his cubicle, quickly looking around for a few seconds. Satisfied with whatever she saw, or didn't see, she went back to his desk and quietly said, "You haven't noticed anything different about Quinn today?"

"No, seems like the same old Quinn. Wait. You're kidding." Heather shook her head before Mike continued, "There's no way she did all that for some guy."

The look Heather gave him said otherwise and made his stomach unsettled because Quinn had never once mentioned liking anyone. Then again, he and Quinn never talked much about relationships and dating.

"Who is the guy anyway?"

"You know, I never took you for one of the dense ones."

"You're talking about me?" he asked with a finger pointed at himself.

Heather grinned and nodded.

"That's crazy, Quinn doesn't like me."

Uncharacteristically, she didn't say anything at all choosing to just smirk and shrug instead.


	3. Chapter 3

"I think I'm going to do it."

"Do what?" Mike asked, not really paying attention to her as he channel surfed.

"I think I'm going to have Shelby tell Beth who I am."

That got Mike's attention as his finger froze above the button to change the channel. Quinn hadn't mentioned Beth since that time when she had brought over those cupcakes earlier in the year and he just figured that she had decided what to do a long time ago. While his brain tried to catch up, she had continued talking.

"–don't have to say anything. I just… needed to tell someone."

"Oh."

"I don't think I've ever been so terrified in my life." He turned and found her staring blankly at the TV screen. "What if she hates me for giving her up?"

"She won't."

"What if she does?" she asked as he looked over at him. "I keep imagining coming home one day and finding a pile of all the gifts I've given her on my doorstep."

He laughed then said, "That's insane. She's a teenager. There's no way she's giving up a bunch of stuff she loves."

"Exactly, she's a teenager. Teenagers do crazy things. We have first-hand knowledge on how crazy they can be."

The TV rose in volume as something excited happened while he spent a few seconds to gather his thoughts.

"Have you talked with Beth before?"

She shook her head as she said, "No, I send her gifts and I get thank you notes back."

"Oh."

"Shelby says Beth wants to meet the awesome aunt who's always sending her cool gifts," she said with a smile. "Her notes have even gotten a more personal."

"You could always write her back."

"I know, but I think my first conversation with her should be a real conversation, not just a letter from her awesome aunt."

"Might be easier if you write it down," he said with a shrug.

She nodded then fell silent.

"It'll be fine," he said. "When she hears the story she'll understand."

The expression on her face made it seem like she wasn't exactly convinced which he thinks might be why she licked her lips and asked, "Can I make the call from here? You know, in case things don't work out?"

"And if things do work out like I think they will? How are you gonna repay me for clearing an entire afternoon or evening for you?"

The quivering of her lips gave away the fact she wanted to smile but, after a bit of a struggle, she kept her face straight and said, "Pig's feet stew for dinner."

"You hate that stuff."

"But you love it for some reason."

"What can I say? The Chinese will eat anything." He grinned. "What about dessert?"

"Quit being greedy. I'm just coming over to make a phone call."

Mike laughed and nodded then watched as Quinn exhaled.

"Just let me know when you're gonna make the call."

"I will. And thanks."

XXX

The phone call happened the next weekend.

After starting the stew in his pressure cooker, she paced in front of his couch for a good five minutes before he said her name. That snapped her out of whatever place her mind was in, but she still didn't make the call and just stared at his living room floor. He took things into his own hands by walking over and placing them onto her shoulders, feeling a slight shiver run through her.

"What if she doesn't like me?"

"You may find it hard to believe, but you're an easy person to like."

"You're right. I do find that hard to believe."

Ignoring that heartbreaking comment, he gently squeezed her shoulders and said, "You'll be fine."

"Why are you so nice to me?"

"Because you're the saddest girl I've ever met."

Her head lifted. "Wha—"

"But, you're also the strongest person I know."

She dropped her head again. "No, I'm not."

"Yes, you are. I know what you went through in high school and you're the only person I know who could have gotten through that." He squeezed her shoulders again. "You can do this."

She looked up and nodded. He stepped back, letting her make the call. Not that it was done quickly as she stared at her phone for a minute before finally dialing the number.

Her pacing resumed.

Just because she wanted to be here didn't mean she wanted him to listen to her conversation, so when she stopped pacing and began talking, he went to the kitchen and turned down the heat on the stew. He took the look on Quinn's face when he looked back to be a good sign and headed to his bedroom to grab a zip-up hoodie.

It took a few seconds for him to scribble a note down on a piece of paper, saying he was going out for some groceries. It took a few more seconds to actually confirm that the conversation was going well and by the smile on her face he was pretty sure it was, he got her attention and gave her the note. With a roll of the eyes and a shooing motion with her hand, she went back to her conversation after glancing at the note.

The last thing he heard as he left the apartment was her laughter and he knew everything would be alright between Beth and Quinn.

XXX

"What'd you do with your spare time besides hang out with me?" Quinn asked one day during a quiet moment while they both were in her office.

Not really thinking, he said the first thing that came to mind: "The usual stuff."

Quinn, none too pleased with his flippant answer, raised an eyebrow and said, "Like?"

"Hang out with other people, read books, listen to music, go to a dance studio. You know that usual stuff."

"You still dance?"

"I do, but it's nothing organized. I just mess around with some people at the studio."

"Oh." She glanced down at her desk before continuing to talk. "When was the last time you did something on the weekend without me?"

It took a few seconds for him to respond because it wasn't something he knew off the top of his head.

"Uh, went out to a bar with the guys a couple of weeks ago." He twisted his lips around for a second. "I think."

Her lips pursed for a moment like she was unsure of something before she spoke again. "I'm not taking up too many of your weekends am I?"

"Didn't we talk about this already?"

"Yea, but—"

"But nothing. If I need a weekend, I'd tell you."

He waited to see if Quinn would continue talking and, for a few seconds, it seemed like she would but, when her head bowed, he followed suit and went back to the paper he was reading. It didn't take long for her to speak again.

"When was the last time you went on a date?"

Now that was a question that Mike had to think about and even then he couldn't remember anything specific. "Uh… months and months ago probably. Why are you asking?"

"Why haven't you been dating?"

His eyes narrowed slightly at the obvious side-stepping of his question but he ignored it because there was no point in mentioning it. "Haven't felt like it."

"Why?"

"LA kinda made me sick of the whole dating scene."

"How so?"

"I don't know if it was the people I hung out with or something else, but everything seemed fake out there. One night stands, casual relationships, and all that fun stuff."

"Doesn't sound so different from plenty of other places."

He shrugged and said, "I'm sure it's not, but I came to realize I didn't like what that city was doing to me, so getting this job was the perfect reason to get away from that city."

"What was the city doing to you?"

"You know: one night stands, casual relationships, and all that fun stuff."

"You did all those things?" she asked with a tone that betrayed the disappointment she kept off of her face.

"I'm not proud of it."

"You were a man slut," she deadpanned.

He laughed and shrugged. "I guess, but I'm not ashamed of it either. It was just something I did. I guess it was a case of 'monkey see, monkey do' with the group of people I hung out with and it was fine for a while but I started to want more and I couldn't seem to find it there."

"Am I keeping you from dating?"

He sighed then said, "Why do you always believe you're stopping me from doing anything I want?"

"Because… we spend a lot of time together and it doesn't leave you with a lot."

Mike sighed. He knew Quinn could be stubborn sometimes but this was getting to be a bit much.

"Listen, I'm going to say this one more time: I hang out with you because we're friends, but, more importantly, because I want to."

He didn't know what kind of response he would get but it sure wasn't a smile that didn't come close to reaching her eyes.

XXX

Thinking over that conversation with Quinn off and on for two days brought Mike to the conclusion that he had absolutely no idea why he hadn't been on a date in months.

This problem was easily solved by asking out someone who had caught his eye. Conveniently, she worked in the same building and just happened to get in at around the same time as him. He wasn't positive, but he thought with the way she looked at him when they did catch the same elevator he had a shot with her. That hunch proved to be correct as she accepted his offer of dinner by asking him what took so long.

The dinner was perfectly pleasant. Any apprehension due to having not dated in a while quickly vanished when he found out they were in neighboring industries with her being a policy wonk for a think tank. That led to all sorts of lively political discussions which eventually led to them agreeing that work talk would be banned for the rest of the night. That led to him finding out, that aside from being smart, she had a wickedly funny, yet horribly dirty, sense of humor and a love for horses that bordered on scary. Combined with the fact that anyone he could have asked would have said she was pretty and it was amazing he had basically stumbled into this date with her.

They made plans for a second date.

XXX

"It feels like it's been forever since we've had a movie night."

Quinn smiled and said, "It's only been a few weeks."

"I know, but I've missed them."

She smiled again as she finished plating their dinner of homemade fried chicken and brought the plates over to the table, but said nothing.

"So, what have you been up to with all your newfound time on the weekends?"

"Not much," she said with a shrug. "I've been catching up on some reading. And…I went out on a date."

"Oh? And how was that?" he asked as they took their seats.

"Nothing to write home about, but everything is progress, right?"

He grinned and said, "Yea and you'll get it right one day."

With a wry smile, she said, "Maybe," then looked down and began eating, trying to be dignified by using utensils but then giving up all pretense since clean and fried chicken were two things that didn't go well together. He, on the other hand, didn't even bother and just dug in with his hands.

"Are you planning on getting it right this time around?" Quinn asked while he had a mouth full of chicken.

Quickly chewing and swallowing allowed him to say, "I hope so."

"I take it things are going well?"

He grinned behind the piece of chicken he held in his hands. "They are. She's smart, funny, and sexy and we have fun together."

"Oh." Her lips pursed and she wrung a napkin with her hands before dabbing her mouth with it. "I'm glad."

He couldn't help but notice that she had almost a full plate of food when they finished eating. When he asked her about it, all she said was that she wasn't that hungry. He took her at her word and gladly ate the leftovers while they watched TV.

XXX

"I hear you broke up with whatsherface."

Mike spun around and stared at Heather in disbelief. "How do you find out about these things? I did it over the weekend and didn't tell anyone yet."

"When a woman gets dumped by a guy like you, she tells her friends. Those friends talk to other people and those people talk and so on and so on, and it eventually gets back to me. Plus you made it so much easier when you dated someone in the building, so thanks for that."

"You're welcome?"

Heather walked over, ran her hand through his hair, and said, "So why'd you do it?"

"I don't know," he said while shaking his head. "Something was just missing and I figured that ending it after a month would be better than ending it after a year."

"You better invite me to your wedding," she said as she ran a hand through his hair again. "After seeing who you dumped, I wanna know just what kind of woman is good enough for you."

"Hey, I'm not that demanding. Sometimes people just don't click."

"You mean like how you and Quinn click?" she asked with a grin.

"We're friends. You know, like how you and me are friends."

Heather laughed. "Your friendship with me is nothing like the…_friendship_ you have with Quinn. For one, I don't want to sleep with you."

"She doesn't want to sleep with me. She didn't even care that I was dating someone."

"Oh Mike, don't be naïve. A girl like Quinn won't tip her hand. You've gotta make the first move, but you should know this already."

XXX

"Hold still."

Mike grinned as he watched Quinn composing the picture she was trying to take of him as they stood near the entrance of the National Zoo.

"Almost got it."

"You know, you're a terrible photographer."

"Shut up." The camera shutter released. "Got it."

"Took you long enough," he said as he pulled up his own DSLR and fired off some candid shots of Quinn until she noticed and glared at him.

When he noticed that she wasn't paying attention anymore, he brought his camera back up and continued to shoot her as she looked around and took her own pictures. When she caught him this time around, she just rolled her eyes and ignored him. This day was something he wanted to document and he had a hunch that Quinn would feel the same way someday. Even if she said otherwise right now.

He hid his smile behind his camera as, every so often, she looked at her phone. Quinn liked to believe that she presented an emotionless façade to the world, but if he paid attention to the details he could see little cracks in that mask. He grabbed as many shots of her looking at her phone as he could, the bad ones to be deleted and the best one given to her one day. Maybe Christmas since they were more than halfway through the year.

As he was planning this out, he caught something out of the corner of his eye which made him take a few steps away and to the side of Quinn. He quickly recomposed his shot to place Quinn off to the side and took as many pictures as he could. This was the moment he really wanted to capture.

"What are you doing?" she asked, turning to face him.

"Nothing, just wanted to shoot from a different angle."

Looking as if she didn't believe him at all, she went back to her own photos which gave him the opportunity to include the pair of people, one tall brunette and a shorter blonde, walking up behind Quinn.

The taller of the two waved.

He waved back which caught Quinn's attention, causing her to freeze then slowly turn around. To say there was a mix of emotions, ranging from surprise to terror to joy, on her face when she saw Shelby and Beth would have been an understatement. That was the look he wanted to remember.

The other pair stopped a few yards away and absolutely nothing happened. Mike would've laughed at the little showdown they were having if he didn't think Quinn would tear him a new one. Shelby caught his eyes then rolled hers and he grinned back. When he did, she gave Beth a little shove. Mike followed suit with a nudge to Quinn. Their actions finally got the pair of blondes moving, slowly. But, moving nonetheless.

After Quinn took a few steps, Mike slowly followed and finally got a good look at Beth. She was the spitting image of her mother, with only a slightly wider chin and nose which seemed to be the only contributions from Puck. When they stopped a few feet away from each other, he could only grin which he saw Shelby doing as well.

"Hi."

"Hi," Beth said back as they moved in to hug each other. "Took you long enough to meet me, _mom_."

"Took you long enough to come out here, brat."

For some reason Mike expected this coming conversation to be climactic, instead all he got was Beth—who, apparently was a pretty big smartass—telling Quinn what new songs she had learned to play on the guitar. This made sense since they had been talking regularly ever since that first phone from his place, but this was the first time they had seen each other in over a decade. He supposed that did count for something anyway as the pair headed into the zoo, leaving him and Shelby trailing behind.

"I guess we've been replaced."

Shelby laughed. "I hope so, raising a kid is hard. I could use a break."

He tried to make small talk as best he could with the former show choir director but they didn't have much in common, so much of his time trailing the blondes was spent taking photos of them and the animals at the zoo. The animals were animals and he'd seen those before. He had never seen Quinn interact with anyone like she did when she was with Beth.

It wasn't as though Quinn was free and loose around her daughter. He didn't think there would ever come a time when she would be completely free and loose around anyone, but he had seen moments of that freedom. There was certainly some of that in her interactions with Beth, but it was more of a willing openness to discuss personal issues and sharing personal experiences he had never heard. Even though he was standing mere feet away from her, those stories weren't for him so he tried not to pay attention while shooting.

The conversation became hard to ignore when Beth said, "So, am I getting a new uncle soon?"

"No. What are you talking about?"

"You're always talking about this Mike guy. I just assumed he was your boyfriend."

"No. That's—"

"Is that him?" Beth asked, glancing at him.

"No. Wait, I mean, yes that is him." Quinn looked over. "But he's not my boyfriend."

"Why not?"

Quinn stared at him wide-eyed and mouth slightly agape which he took as his cue to step in.

"HI, I don't think we've really been introduced yet." He held out his hand. "I'm Mike, Quinn's friend you've heard all about, and I'd be a terrible boyfriend."

Beth giggled as she took his hand.

"You giggle, but it's true. I'm rude and mean and all sorts of nasty things."

Beth giggled again, let go of his hand, and said, "Quinn's said pretty much the opposite. Didn't say you were so silly though."

"Silly? Me?" He plastered one of his patented goofy faces on for a second, drawing more giggles from Beth. "Never."

"Don't pay attention to him," Quinn said. "He's plenty silly."

"Okay, that's enough of this disgusting display," Shelby said as she walked up. "If it goes on any longer, I'm going to be washing my own puke from Beth's hair."

Beth made a face and said, "Mom!"

Shelby smiled and tried to brush Beth's cheek who pulled away with a mock disgusted look. "So, dinner?" she asked as she rolled her eyes.

"Yea," Quinn said. "There are plenty of good restaurants around here."

"Well, we've got no idea what's good so that's up to you and Mike," Shelby said.

Mike didn't really care where they ate, but Quinn insisted on talking about it. Normally, Quinn wouldn't have cared about this, but he guessed that she wanted to make this day special — Well, more special — so he humors her. They spent the next few minutes discussing the pros and cons of the restaurants around the zoo with Quinn picking apart every single restaurant he suggested, even the ones he knew she would happily eat at for the rest of her life.

"Okay," he said after she shot down yet another suggestion. "Where would you like to eat?'

"I don't know. That's what we're trying to decide."

"No, that's what I'm trying to do. I have no idea what you're trying to do."

Quinn glared at him, but Beth's giggles put a quick end to that.

"I bet Shelby and Beth don't even care where we eat," he said.

"We really don't," Shelby said.

"We could go to that bar I saw across the street," Beth said.

"Absolutely not," Quinn and Shelby said at the same time.

"That's…freaky…," Beth said. "I don't like it at all."

Everyone except Beth laughed at that who glared at them which only made the adults laugh harder.

"Alright, enough of this," he said as he placed a hand on Quinn's lower back and guided her forward. "I'm picking a place and you can't say no."

Quinn wrinkled her nose then grinned. "Fine. I won't."

"I'm so getting an uncle," he heard Beth say and when he looked over at Quinn, she was rolling her eyes, but the grin was still on her face.

XXX

Besides work and nerdy TV shows/movies there was another major interest that Mike shared with Quinn and that was food. When they weren't sitting on his couch vegging out in front of his TV, they were out at whatever new restaurant the food bloggers were raving about. Or Quinn would have his kitchen commandeered to try out a recipe from one of her seemingly endless cookbooks. And with a love of food came a love of wine, enjoyed on its own or paired with food.

So, they were both thrilled when Restaurant Week came around in the fall which was basically an excuse for them to eat lunch or dinner at some of the most popular restaurants in town for less than what they would usually have to pay. Some days they ate with other people. Some, like dinner this Friday night, they were on their own.

"So, what'd you think?"

Mike made a face then brought his hand up and waggled it.

"Yea, that place isn't going on our return list."

Mike shrugged.

"Are you not talking for the rest of the night?"

He shrugged again then noticed that she was rubbing her bare arms and said, "Cold?"

"A little."

"We should've taken a taxi," he said as he draped his suit jacket over her shoulders.

"I wanted to walk back," she said, tugging the jacket a bit tighter. "Plus, we weren't taking a taxi to go five blocks down the street."

With a grin, he threw an arm around her shoulders and pulled her along at a quicker pace until she elbowed him in the ribs.

"Wanna grab a drink?" he asked as they started passing a cluster of bars on the street where their apartments were.

The feeling of her shaking head against his arm and chest was the only response he got and the little stumble in her step was the only explanation he needed. Mike didn't know if it was the wine in his stomach or the heat from her head against his chest, but he felt like there was a feather tickling his insides.

Her place was closest to the restaurant and they only had to walk a few more minutes to get to the front steps of her building. That was where Mike found himself waiting as she hunted through her bag for her keys. He had to grin as her face took on a more and more annoyed look, the longer it took her to find her keys. A sound of triumph came from her as she finally yanked her keys out of her bag with a grin then held them above her head like a trophy.

He grinned at her antics, thinking that the wine from dinner must have hit her a bit harder than usual, and she sheepishly smiled back after she brought her hand down. A street light hit her blonde hair just right as she gently swayed to some unknown beat, making it seem as though her entire face was glowing. He made the decision was made right then and there and leaned forward. The last thing he saw on her face before he closed his eyes and his lips touched hers was surprise. Or panic.

At first, he figured it was surprise because he felt her press into him and tasted the hint of the wine on the softest pair of lips he had ever known. However, he settled on panic when her hands came up and pushed him away, the keys in her right hand digging into his chest. That was confirmed as he pulled back and she scrambled to open the door to her building, looking as flustered as he had ever seen her.

Before she disappeared inside, he barely heard her say, "Goodnight."

This mess was the wine's fault. Or at least that was what he told himself.


	4. Chapter 4

It took a forgotten umbrella to get Quinn to talk about the kiss.

Correction: It took a forgotten umbrella to get Quinn to talk to him at all. It had been the longest week of his life while Quinn ignored him aside from work related matters. Even then, she only talked to him if she had to and kept the conversation as short as possible. Lunch, she spent alone in her office with the door closed while Heather gladly took the opportunity all week long to bug him about Quinn's behavior as his new lunch partner.

Plenty of women had turned him down before but that didn't lessen the pain of this clear rejection. The worst part about this one was that he hadn't even meant to do it. As the week went on though, he began to realize that he wanted to date Quinn which made things even worse. And he had probably ruined their friendship by being so forward. A simple date invitation would have been the better plan, but his brain had a different, and much worse, plan. But there was plenty of time to drink scotch while adding last Friday to his list of regrets. He needed a way to salvage his friendship with Quinn so he wouldn't have to add that to the list.

Which brought him back to a forgotten umbrella. And a pouring rainstorm with drops so heavy that it made sound like a rainforest instead of a city street. And him standing under the awning of the office building checking his phone to see if and when the rain would stop. Or if he would have to make a mad, two-block dash to the Metro station. Which was then he got a text from Quinn.

_Look up_

He did and saw a red Mini Cooper idling next to the curb with its hazard lights flashing. His phone chimed again and he looked back down.

_Hurry up and get in_

Putting away his phone and then covering his head with his bag, he sprinted towards the car and dove in when Quinn flung the door open for him.

"Hey," he said, a little out of breath.

She pulled away from the curb before she said, "Hey."

"I didn't know you owned a car."

"I don't. This is one of those rentals. Zipcar or something. I picked it up since I saw it was gonna be raining all day."

"Oh."

"I mean, it's not like I need a car since all I do is hang out with—"

She cut herself off and concentrated on driving which, on one hand, Mike could appreciate since her weaving through traffic in the pouring rain took away his breath even more than his recent dash. On the other, he knew exactly why she stopped talking and it made the car ride utterly uncomfortable. Still, this was his best chance this entire week to actually talk with her so he didn't get out immediately when they pulled up in front of his apartment.

"So…about last Friday."

It took a long second before she said, "What about last Friday?"

"Don't you think we should talk about what happened?"

"No, why should we? We're fine."

"Except that we aren't." He looked over. "We've barely talked this entire week."

Staring at the raindrops on the windshield, her face was expressionless, but the squeaking coming from the steering wheel as her hands wrung it gave her away. He guessed that she didn't notice the noise because she kept making it. That was the only sound she made for almost a minute as she stared ahead and he stared at her.

Right before he got sick of the silence in the car, she said, "I can count the number of friends I have on one hand and you're one of them." Noticing what her hands were doing, she finally stopped wringing the steering wheel and folded them on her lap. "In fact, you're probably the closest friend I've ever had. And…I don't want to screw that up. So—"

"No, I get it," he said. "I shouldn't have kissed you."

"That's not—"

It was immature of him, but he cut her off again because he didn't want to hear what Quinn had to say even though he had been so eager to have this conversation just minutes earlier. He had been rejected already. He didn't need Quinn to do it a second time.

"You can keep coming over if you want. I won't do anything stupid again, but I understand if you think it'll be too awkward. I just hope we can still be friends."

Her eyes dropped then glanced to the left, at the windshield. When they returned to his, her lips pursed then opened so she could say, "Yea, of course we can still be friends."

It was the best he could hope for, but he wasn't happy about it. From the look on Quinn's face as he got out, she didn't look too thrilled either.

XXX

Quinn didn't stop by his place that rainy weekend. When she didn't show up the next Friday, he gave up hope she would stop by that weekend, so it surprised him when he found her knocking at his door as he finished getting ready to go out on Saturday night.

"Sorry, I should have texted," she said, standing just outside his apartment.

"No, it's alright. I was just gonna grab a drink."

"Oh." She looked down for a moment. "I— I guess I'll head back home then."

Before he could say anything, she turned and started to walk down the hallway. He stared at her in disbelief for a few seconds before easily catching up and grabbing her wrist. She spun around with a look of shock on her face which caused him to let go. Her other hand covered the place he had grabbed her like it hurt even though he knew he hadn't used much strength at all.

"Sorry. Did I hurt you?" he asked as he took a step forward.

She took a step back and his face fell.

"No, you just surprised me," she said as she rubbed her wrist for a second then dropped her hands to her side.

"So, um, I don't have to go get a drink. We can go back to my place and do our usual thing."

She shook her head. "I'll come by some other time."

"Oh." A great idea pops into his head and he hopes she likes it too. "You wanna get a drink with me?"

"Aren't you going with other people?"

"No," he said with a grin, "I was gonna be a loser and drink by myself."

It seemed like she would turn him down, but she smiled and said, "Yea, I'd like that."

XXX

It took a few more weeks before things returned to normal. Or at least as normal as they could be.

Things were still a bit awkward between them, especially now that they both knew he looked at her as a romantic, albeit very remote, possibility. He found himself staring at her whenever he got the chance and she caught him quite a few times causing them both to quickly look away. Frankly, it was ridiculous how they were acting like they were back in high school. Although, he was pretty sure he never acted like this in high school and, from what he could remember, neither did Quinn.

"What is going on between you and Quinn?" Heather asked as she continued to trace the life-lines on his right hand one day while she was bugging him, again, in his cubicle.

"Nothing."

She pinched his wrist, ignored the "ow" that came from him, and said, "Don't lie to me. You two have been weird ever since that week when you didn't speak to each other."

"Nothing's going on," he said as he awkwardly used one hand to turn the page of the book he was reading. "Go back to work."

"Already finished all my work." She smacked herself on the forehead. "Wait, I'm a moron. You two got drunk, slept together, and one of you got all emotional about it." She tapped her lips with her index finger a few times. "It's you being all emotional isn't it?"

"Yea, that's it. We're starring in a real-life rom-com."

She pinched him much harder this time. "Watch the sarcasm."

"Fine. Alright. I kissed her and she basically shoved me away. That's what happened. Happy?"

"No," She said as she stroked his palm a few times. "What is wrong with that woman?"

"Nothing's wrong with her. She doesn't like me and that's that."

"You're wrong. I just don't understand why she's denying it." He flipped to the next page then hear her say, "You know, we sound like we're in a rom-com now."

"Uh huh."

"Just means you two will get together in the end."

"Uh huh." He glanced back her and grinned. "You know…that makes you the crazy friend right?"

She laughed and said, "Shut up."

XXX

Mike had just sat down to eat his dinner of day-old rice and kung pao chicken when someone started to bang on his door. He groaned as he got up because all he wanted to do after work was sit around and do nothing. And dealing with annoying neighbors was not part of nothing.

He opened the door and found Quinn standing there with tears streaming down her face. They stared at each other for a second before he said, "What happened?"

In response, she took two quick steps forward, wrapped her arms around him, and buried her face into his chest.

These weren't the silent and almost motionless tears she had when things went bad with Andrew. This time her entire body shook as she gulped down lungfuls of air to fuel her sobbing. He pulled his arms free from hers and he felt her pulling on the back of his shirt as she tightened her grip on him. With nothing else to do, he walked backwards and basically dragged her inside, over to his couch.

They stood in front of it for a while. He didn't know how long they did as he ran his hands up and down her back while she cried, but eventually her body stopped being racked by sobs.

"Sit down," he said softly.

It took her a second before she let go and sat down. It was stupid, but the fact that she didn't even look behind her before letting go filled him with a sense of relief. He grabbed a glass of water before sitting down next to her, something she hadn't allowed to happen ever since the kiss.

"What happened?"

A sob escaped from her mouth before she could say, "Beth was in a car accident."

His hand found hers as he asked, "Is she okay?"

She shook her head as more tears streamed down her face. "Shelby says they airlifted her to a hospital."

"But she's gonna be okay, right?"

"I don't know." She held out her phone. "Shelby's gonna call when she finds out more."

He looked down and saw that the phone barely had any battery left so he pulled it out of her hand and plugged it in to his charger.

Quinn murmured her thanks and he nodded while holding his arms open because it was all he could do. Any problems she might have had with being close to him had vanished as she buried her face into his chest again. She did it with enough force that he lost his balance and fell over onto his back. When she made no move to get up, he figured that she didn't mind their new position so he went back to gently stroking her back.

Eventually, she lifted her head up ever so slightly and turned it so she was looking blankly at the black screen of the TV.

It made his neck hurt, staring at the top of her head and the position it was in, so he asked, "Do you wanna get up?"

She shook her head.

"Do you wanna watch something?"

She nodded.

It took a bit of stretching, but he was able to get a finger on the remote which let him drag it over to him. He settled on a Top Chef marathon because he knew she loved the show and would happily watch hours and hours of it. So that's what they did. Or that's what he did because she was fast asleep when he looked down part way through the first episode. A line of drool trickled out of her mouth, down to his shirt, and he wondered if it was a regular occurrence or if it was just an effect of the emotional night.

A whimper escaped from Quinn's mouth and she turned her head so she was facing towards the couch. His thumb paused over her cheek because he knew it was a bad idea to get any closer to her. He figured she knew it was a bad idea too since she had kept her distance, literally and figuratively, but she needed someone tonight. Even though what brought her here was terrible, he was glad that she still thought of him as someone she could trust. In the end, he thought it really couldn't hurt so he gently wiped away the drool from her cheek.

Figuring that her neck could use the rest, he carefully, and awkwardly, slid out from underneath her and rolled her over onto her back at the same time. Thankfully she stayed asleep during that strange maneuver and he went to grab a plate of his cold leftovers because he hadn't touched the food at all because not even this awful thing could change the fact he was hungry. With nowhere else to sit, he slid the coffee table away from the couch a bit so he could fold his body between the two and continue watching Top Chef.

Just as the second episode finished up a scream came from behind him and he slammed his shin into the table in front of him in his rush to turn around. When he did, he found Quinn sitting straight up breathing heavily and looking around. Seeing him there on the floor in front of her, a wave of relief washed over her face as she clutched at her chest with her hands.

"Mike!"

"Yea?" He rubbed his shin. "Ow."

"I— I thought you…"

He barely noticed her trailing off since pain was still shooting through his shin, but he did notice. He also noticed one of her hands as it tentatively reached out and touched his chest, almost as if she didn't believe he was right there in front of her.

"Thought I what?" he asked as his hand covered hers.

"Nothing." She took some deep breaths as she shook her head and took her hand back. "It's nothing. Just a dream."

His imagination thought of hundreds of things that she could have dreamed about, none of them good.

"How long was I asleep?"

"An hour and a half?"

"Did Shelby call?"

"No. I would have woken you up."

"Right." She closed her eyes and exhaled. "Of course."

Her phone rang behind him and they both jumped. It only took him a second to disconnect it from the charger and hand it to her. She stared at it, reminding him of her first phone call with Beth and a different sort of seriousness. Only this time it didn't take her nearly as long to put it up to her ear as the last. And he had no idea if things would work out or any encouraging words.

Luckily, the conversation she had with Shelby was short and all he needed to see was the deep breath and smile from her to know that Beth's injuries weren't life threatening.

"She's gonna be fine. A mild concussion, a few broken ribs, and a punctured lung that they had to re-inflate." By now she was wearing a stupid grin on her face. "They're gonna keep her in the hospital for a few days for observation, but she's gonna be fine."

Her grin was infectious because he was wearing one too as he said, "Good. That's great news."

They spent the next few seconds grinning at each other like the clinically insane before he yawned causing her to yawn which caused them to grin again.

"I'm exhausted," she said with a drooping head after they finally stopped grinning.

"Nap didn't help?"

She glanced down before she said, "Not really."

That was an exceedingly stupid comment he made trying to be quick witted and he knew it. Dropping his head, he tried to think of something more upbeat to say but his tired mind wasn't very helpful.

Things were made easy for him when she said, "Mike."

He lifted his head.

"Can— can I spend the night here?" His fog-addled mind had a hard time processing her question which she must have taken as his way of trying to come up with an excuse because she continued, "It's okay if you say no. I—"

"You can take my bed," he said as he got up. "I'll sleep out here."

"What? No!"

"Well, we can both sleep on the couch or you can take my bed. Choice is yours."

The grin came back before rubbed her neck and she said, "You do make an awful bed."

XXX

He checked in on her the next morning and saw her asleep, sprawled out across his bed, with the covers flung halfway off. It was still a work day, so after he straightened the covers he went through his morning routine and headed into the office.

It wasn't surprising when he heard that she called out mid-morning because she wasn't feeling well. No one complained or cared since it seemed like this was the first sick day that she had ever taken the entire time she was employed at Patton Boggs. Other than that, the day was pretty normal: He did work. Heather ignored hers and bugged him. He ate lunch. Heather continued to bug him. He got ready to leave for the day. Heather kept on bugging him.

When he got back to his place, he had to stop just inside the entrance and stare. Apparently, Quinn decided to clean up a bit before she left because his apartment was the cleanest it had been since just before he moved his first box of junk in. And by a bit, he meant a lot since there was crap sitting in neat piles or organized logically in drawers that he thought he threw away or lost during the move from Los Angeles.

Even the mess from dinner last night and a hurried breakfast this morning left in the kitchen was gone. His bedroom held more of the same, although there were piles of dirty laundry separated by washing requirements on the floor, but other than that the room looked wonderfully neat. He fixed that by stripping out of his work clothes and throwing them onto the made bed.

It was completely stupid, but all of this made him ridiculously happy and he failed at trying to keep a grin from appearing on his face. In hindsight, he was far too happy as he pulled out his phone to text her.

_Thanks for cleaning_

_Thank you for last night. It meant a lot that you were there for me_

He stared at what he typed out for a few seconds before dropping his phone and walking away. Thinking how immature he was acting, he came back minutes later and replied, _You know I'll always be there for you_

When she didn't respond for a few minutes, he figured she got caught up in something. When those few minutes stretched into 10 then 20, he worried that his last text might have ruined things again. Finally, his phone chimed again.

_I know. Thanks for being the best friend I've ever had_

Even though part of him knew it might have been coming, the f-word killed him.

XXX

"Who's got the first round?" Quinn asked as they walked into a bar to start their happy hour.

Mike and Heather immediately tapped their noses with their respective index fingers and said, "Not it."

Quinn turned around and glared at them.

"We'll grab seats," Heather said as she dragged Mike around Quinn and towards an open table.

When they had shrugged off their coats and taken seats opposite each other and Heather had taken a good long look behind him, she said, "Things between you and Quinn have gotten better."

"Yea," he said with a shrug, "I guess."

"Good. I don't like it when mom and dad are fighting."

It took him a second to process that thought and he made a face when he did. "That's…a disturbing thought."

"What? You and Quinn being parents together?"

"No. Having you for a kid."

"Hey!" He felt a kick from under the table. "I was an awesome kid."

"I'm sure you were. I just don't want you as mine."

Heather laughed then smiled wickedly at him before saying, "So, you don't find that other thought disgusting?"

"What's disgusting?" Quinn asked as she walked up with three glasses of beer clutched between her hands.

Mike stared at Heather, not sure how to respond because he didn't think Quinn would appreciate Heather's joke about mom and dad fighting.

Thankfully, Heather probably thought the same so, as she took a glass from Quinn, she said, "Oh, I was telling Mike all sorts of things about birth control."

Quinn gave the other woman an incredulous look. "Why?"

Heather shrugged. "Because I felt like it."

Quinn looked over at Mike and he shrugged as well before she handed him a glass and slid next to him on the bench seat.

"Speaking of birth control," Heather continued much to Quinn's dismay, "there's a woman on the third floor who's pregnant again. Now that's a person who could use a talk about birth control."

Mike laughed while Quinn groaned and drank her beer. He loved happy hour, especially if there were two people he love being with sitting at the table with him.


	5. Chapter 5

Mike jerked awake and immediately wished he hadn't.

A sledgehammer pounded away at his brain and his entire body felt like it had been hit with said sledgehammer for hours on end. He cracked his eyes open and the hammer just hit harder. He heard a moan escape from his mouth which didn't help matters either. He was pretty sure he was hungover. Or someone had drugged him. But he went with the hangover because he could vaguely remember a dinner then a bar then a club then maybe another bar, but it might have been memories of the first bar. And drinks, lots of drinks.

Oh, and snow for some reason.

He groaned again, stretched out his arms and legs, then reconsidered the whole "being drugged" theory. The left side of his body was pressed up against something soft and cushy while there was just empty air to his right. He poked at whatever he was lying on and decided the surface was too rough to be a bed and tried to open his eyes again. It hurt this time too.

Something soft, soothing, and cool covered his forehead and the pounding in his head quieted, not completely, but enough that he moaned in relief. It might have been his hungover imagination, but he would have sworn that he heard someone giggling above him.

"Relax," a voice whispered into his ear. "Everything's gonna be alright."

Even if the giggling might have been imagined, he knew those words were real. More importantly, he believed them which let him relax and drift off back into sleep.

He woke up again.

This time with only a toy hammer of a headache and a body that didn't feel like it had just crossed the finishing line of an Ironman triathlon. His hands felt around and came up with the same surroundings as before, so he knew he hadn't dreamt up that little scene. As a bonus, his headache didn't get worse when he opened his eyes.

What he saw made him reconsider that whole being drugged theory again because someone had kidnapped him and stuck him on the couch in the living room found in some modern decorating magazine. And not some post-modern one with warm colors and thickly cushioned furniture, but one of black and white with silver accents and everything squared away like someone's vision of what the future should look like.

"Good morning sleepyhead," he heard from behind him. "Well, good afternoon."

Mike swung his feet to the ground, sat up, and rubbed his face. Looking over, he found Quinn curled up under a blanket with a book in her hand on the loveseat next to the couch.

"Wha—" He rubbed his face again, harder this time to try and get some more blood flowing to his brain. "Afternoon?"

"Yup." She nodded then lifted her arms above her head as she stretched. "Apparently, if you drink too much you sleep like the dead."

"I don't remember how much I drank last night," he said with his head buried in his hands.

"The bar we were at was passing out free bottles of champagne just before midnight. Granted, it was really cheap stuff."

"I kinda remember holding a bottle of something…" He groaned then went on, "That's the last time I do New Year's Eve with an empty stomach."

Quinn laughed.

"What? Did I do something embarrassing?"

"Mmm… you could say that."

He lifted his head and said, "What'd I do?"

"It was more like something you said."

He narrowed his eyes. "What'd I say?"

"You asked me if I had any Chinese in me and when I said, 'No,' you asked if I would like some."

His mouth flopped open then retracted so he could say, "I did not say that."

She laughed then said, "You did."

"I'm sorry. I sounded like an asshole from a frat."

"It's okay," she said with a smile. "The champagne hit you pretty hard. And I had plenty of experience with said assholes from frats."

As she stretched again, he looked around then said, "Where are we?"

"We're at my place."

"That makes complete sense," he said before he buried his face in his hands again and wondered what the hell had possessed him to make him think it would be a good idea to spend the night at Quinn's? Oh, that's right. That awful, awful champagne.

"How'd I get here?"

"I tried dropping you off first, but you were pretty insistent that I didn't walk back alone. So after you finished your manly duty of escorting me an entire block, you pretty much passed out on my sofa."

Wonderful. He wondered how many more times he had made an ass out of himself last night, but figuring he couldn't do anything about the past, he resolved to get out of her place as fast as he could before his foggy brain could do something else moronic.

"Lemmie use the bathroom and I'll get outta here," he said as he whipped the blanket off and stood up, too fast for Quinn's "Wait!" to have any effect. He froze because all he had on were his boxers and an undershirt. Not even during his drunkest nights at Stanford did he strip out of his clothes, so this was a new experience for him.

"I, um, figured you'd be more comfortable sleeping without your pants or shirt," he heard her say.

"Oh, uh, yea. Thanks." He wiped his hands on his boxers out of the need to do something with his hands. "So about that bathroom."

"Right behind you."

He thanked her and made his was there as quickly as he could. After draining his bladder, he splashed some water on his face and groaned into his hands again. While Quinn didn't seem bothered by this whole thing it couldn't have done good things for their still tenuous friendship. He needed to get out of here before this idiotic brain of his screwed things up again.

"Lemmie put my clothes on and I'll get outta here," he said as he returned to the living room.

"That's probably not a good idea."

He really wished Quinn would stop saying vague things like that. "Huh?"

"Look out the balcony doors."

He did that and saw snow. Lots and lots of snow. At least that part of his memory hadn't let him down.

"Huh."

A thick blanket of snow covered everything he could see and the only thing moving outside the window were the snowflakes falling from the sky. He hadn't seen this much snow since that one storm back when he was a kid in Lima.

"Yea, we got 20 inches overnight and it's still going."

"Huh."

Quinn's reflection made its way next to his and her body heat made him tingle as it contrasted with the cold air trying to make its way through the doors in front of him.

"The city's shut down, probably for a few days."

"Huh," was all he could get out even as he panicked on the inside. Being a drunken ass to Quinn was one thing. Being stuck in her apartment for who knew how long was another, much more awful, yet exciting, thing.

"Here," she said as she held up something, "I grabbed these off your bed when I figured you'd need them."

It took him a second to register that she was holding the shirt and pair of pajamas pants he slept in and usually tossed on his bed in the morning.

"Huh."

She hit him with his own clothes then said, "You know, it's going to be pretty boring if that's all you're going to say."

"Huh? Oh sorry," he said as he closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose for a few seconds. "I'm having a hard time processing all of this."

"What's there to process? Put on your clothes." She handed him the clothing before walking away. "I'm going to make breakfast. Well, late lunch now."

As he put on the pajama pants, his eyes were drawn to something that he couldn't look away from. Whoever had designed those sweatpants with school names screen-printed across the ass was a genius in Mike's mind, especially now that the word "YALE" was slowly making its way to the kitchen. She must have bought the pair of pants during college because he could see the parts of the name of her school had washed away and the waistband fraying, exposing the elastic underneath.

Of course, all of that took a back seat to the gentle curves and swaying underneath that word which reinforced the fact that Quinn was still one of the hottest women he knew. And the less said about the light blue camisole which was a little too short and exposing a ring of skin the better.

"Waffles okay?" she asked, pulling him away from his appreciation.

"Yea."

"Good, because I was gonna make them even if you said no."

"Thanks for the illusion of choice." She shot a shit-eating grin back at him which vanished when he said, "You didn't happen to swipe my toothbrush did you?"

"That…would've been smart. But, I should have some a spare or two in the medicine cabinet."

He plodded back to the bathroom and rooted around her medicine cabinet, trying to not look at the more personal items as he searched for a toothbrush. After ridding his mouth of the feel and taste of whatever had crawled in there to die, he walked up beside Quinn who was standing over a cast iron skillet sautéing some sausage patties.

"I didn't know if you wanted bacon or sausage, so I'm making both."

"Perfect," he said as he poked at the waffle iron on the countertop.

"Stop that. And I can't believe you've stayed skinny all these years with the way you eat."

"It's the dancing, but mostly the Chinese genes."

She groaned and said, "I hate you."

For the lack of anything else to do, he stood there rocking side to side as he watched her cook, stepping aside as needed. Although that wasn't required too much since most of the cooking to be done was watching, what with the bacon being in the oven, sausage in the pan, and waffle in the iron.

The first waffle finished just about the same time as the first batches of bacon and sausage. Mike tried to help as Quinn tried to do three things at once, but she shooed away and completed the plating quickly and efficiently. That was when he saw her uncover a huge bowl of waffle batter.

"Hungry much?"

"I don't get to use this very much since I can't figure out a batter recipe for one."

"You could always have me over more often?"

As soon as that left his mouth, he thought it was the wrong thing to say, but she just laughed and said, "Tired of me coming over all the time?"

"Yea, you're eating me out of house and home."

"Go sit," she said with a mock glare.

"Yes, ma'am."

It had been a long time since someone had made him a home-cooked meal with no effort on his part so he gladly took a seat on the couch again. The fact that it was Quinn cooking made him stupidly happy. Yes, she had cooked dozens upon dozens of meals at his place, but he had helped with each and every one of them. This one felt different because it was the first time they were having breakfast together. Emotions were illogical like that. That glow vanished as he went back to looking around the apartment.

A bookshelf and a TV too small for the room were front and center with a random smattering of photographs on shelves and tables. He wondered why there were so few personal things lying around Then again, she might just have been the type of person who needed to put everything away as evidenced by the cleaning of his place months back, but it still seemed pretty crazy at how little she showed of herself even in her own home.

It still surprised him how nerdy Quinn was as he flipped through the book she had been reading. _Stranger in a Strange Land_ was a book he would never be bored with and, from the dog-eared pages in her copy and underlined passages, she might have felt the same way.

"Do you grok the book?" Quinn asked as she brought over two plates of food, one containing much more than the other, and two glasses of orange juice.

"I don't think anyone can," he said while taking a plate and glass.

She grinned and said, "Good point."

That led them into a discussion about Heinlein's sci-fi classic. He could tell she had thought about the themes in the book since her analysis was so detailed, mirroring the papers she wrote at work. He could also tell she hadn't had the chance to discuss the book with anyone else with the way she kept talking about it, also mirroring what she did at work.

Eventually though their conversation slowed, but before he could take the first bite of what looked to be delicious waffles, his phone rang and he sighed looking at the caller ID.

"Hi mom," he said while giving Quinn a look to which she replied with a grin.

"I saw the news. Are you okay?"

"Yes mom. It's just a little snow. Nothing to worry about."

"Do you have enough food and water?"

"Yes mom. I have enough food and water."

"Are you sure? There's no telling how long you'll be snowed in."

"Yes, I'm sure."

By now, Quinn was failing to fight back her laughter which his mom must have heard since she asked, "Is there someone with you?"

"Uh, yea some people came by last night and one of them couldn't get out before the snow got bad," he said because it was easier than telling the truth.

That lie broke the dam holding back Quinn's laughter. He shot a glare at her which just made her laugh harder and louder.

"Is that a woman's laughter? Am I finally going to get a grandkid?"

He sighed, got up, and walked away because it was going to be one of _those_ conversations. Every so often, his mom just had to tell him that she wasn't getting any younger and she wanted to have grandkids to dote on. To which he always replied that he wanted to have grandkids so she could dote on them but things just hadn't worked out yet. This time was no different.

When he finally got off the phone, he went back to his cold breakfast and a grinning Quinn.

"Grandkids huh?"

"Yea," he said, "she brings it up like clockwork."

Quinn laughed then said, "You must get annoyed."

"Sometimes she'll bring it up in like a dozen conversations in a row and I wish she'd stop talking to me," he said after he finally got a few bites of food down his throat.

Amazingly, he continued to stick his foot in his mouth when it came to things he should have remembered about Quinn. However, she remained unbothered with his bouts of stupidity even as he stumbled his way through an apology.

"Stop apologizing. I know you were just joking and there's nothing less sexy than a guy bumbling through an apology that wasn't needed."

Properly chastised, he nodded and went to shovel another bite of food in his mouth when he froze, slowly turned to look at her, and said, "You think I'm sexy?"

The flush that crept up along her neck and face remained in his dreams and memories for a long time.

XXX

Mike's favorite part of spring was Opening Day. Every year it represented a chance start over with a clean slate, to begin anew, and all those wonderful romantic notions. The past stayed in the past. Or at least that's what Chicago Cubs' fans told themselves every year. Of course, he was in the same boat as them since his favorite team was the Cleveland Indians who always seemed to be mired in varying degrees mediocrity.

The Washington Nationals weren't his favorite team but they still played baseball on Opening Day so he weaseled his way out of work to go see them. Heather dropped everything when she heard what he was doing and, with a little cajoling, Quinn came along too. The food and drink at the park was a little expensive but that was the norm and a few bucks wouldn't stop him from enjoying the spring air, Cracker Jacks, peanuts, and beer. Or the company around him.

Heather had no idea of what was happening on the field in front of her. She seemed happy just to be screaming along with the rest of the crowd behind the home team dugout when she wasn't eating, drinking, or asking Mike a billion questions about the sport. It didn't surprise him that Quinn knew baseball since she seemed to know about pretty much everything. What did surprise him was how into the game she was and how much she liked the Nationals, which made sense since she'd been in DC for so long.

"I'm gonna go grab a drink. You guys want anything?" Heather asked just at the seventh inning stretch began.

Quinn and Mike both declined so Heather left with some new friends she had made in their short time at the game.

"That girl can get anyone to like her," Mike said as he watched her head up the stairs.

"Yea. She's an amazing woman."

Turning his head to look at the mascot dancing on top of the dugout, he said, "I'm surprised more guys don't throw themselves at her."

He wondered why anyone would want to put on that hot and sweaty eagle costume because he imagined the pay couldn't have been that much. Then again, whoever was in there was getting paid to dance, something he couldn't do.

"She talks about you a lot, you know?"

"Who does?" he asked, not really paying attention because the dancing eagle was strangely hypnotizing.

"Heather."

"Huh."

Quinn groaned beside him then said, "Don't start that again."

"What? I've barely used that since New Year's."

"Whatever."

"Plus, I don't really have anything to say." He held up his box of snacks. "Cracker Jack?"

She shook her head and his arm returned to its original position next to hers on the armrest they shared. That armrest had turned out to be Mike's favorite thing today, making him feel like a nervous teenager on his first date as their arms constantly brushed up against and rested along the others. It happened again and he happily watched the eagle dance to crappy top 40 pop songs before she said something else.

"You two should go out."

"Huh?"

"You two should go out," she said again as she pulled her arm away from his and hugged her chest.

"No."

He slowly turned his head to look at her while she whipped hers towards him.

"What?" he asked.

"I think you two would be great for each other."

"Nah," he said with a shake of his head. "She's too…wild for me. Plus, she told me she doesn't like me like that. Just loves bugging me."

"You asked her out?"

"What?" he asked, giving her a confused look for a second. "Oh, no. She said that outta nowhere during some conversation we were having."

A conversation about how he should be going out with Quinn, but that was something he'd keep to himself.

"But haven't you thought of her that way? I mean she's beautiful, intelligent, funny, outgoing—"

"Yea, she's all that and a bag of chips," he said, annoyed and wondering why Quinn telling him this. "But she's not my type."

"Oh," she said, looking down at their arms.

"I'm pretty sure I figured out what my type was after all my adventures in LA." She looked back up at that statement and he stared right at her as he said, "Maybe it's because Tina was my first serious girlfriend, but I like quieter women who can talk when they need to, who like the things I like, and who I can make laugh because I love making the people I like laugh."

"Oh," she said so softly he could barely hear her.

He got the urge to cup her cheek and started to give into that feeling when Heather dropped into the seat next to him and said, "So, what I miss?"

The moment broken, Quinn quickly looked away from him and he slowly faced forward again as he said, "Nothing much, just a dancing bird."

XXX

Quinn left one day and it was all his fucking fault. Okay, so she didn't literally leave, but that's what it felt like.

After their little moment at the baseball game, he decided to try his luck again. Only this time he would actually ask her out instead of kissing her without warning. Deciding that the timing couldn't get any better, he asked her out as she got ready to leave his place after one of their movie nights. It had been a good night and they had decided to watch an old school comedy instead of something from their usual genre of sci-fi/fantasy.

They were both still feeling the aftereffects of the movie as they laughed their way through what little cleaning up they had to do and as she got ready to leave. Those feelings vanished when he asked her out and he knew he had fucked up as soon as the joy fell off her face as they stood in front of his open door.

She declined his invitation and softly apologized as she walked out the door.

After a bit of reflection, he decided that this was a good thing. It didn't do him any good to pine after someone who didn't return the feeling and Quinn had told him in more ways than one that she didn't feel the same way about him. The only thing that stopped him from throwing away the entire relationship was that their friendship meant something to her, and to him. Things might get awkward but they would smooth out like before and, when they did, he'd pull away a little.

She beat him to the punch and then some.

XXX

"Why are you and Quinn fighting this time?"

He looked up at Heather from his drink and said, "We're not fighting."

"They you two should be nominated for acting awards for the performance you're giving."

"Very funny," he said after taking a drink. "But we're not fighting. We're just…not really talking."

Heather leaned in and asked, "Did you kiss her again?"

"No. I asked her out."

She frowned then sat back in her seat before saying, "I would have bet anything that she liked you. Sorry for pushing you towards her."

"No, it's okay," he said as he shook his head, "I wouldn't have done anything if I didn't like her."

She frowned again before smiling then saying, "Okay, on to happier things. What's the job offer I hear you got?"

"What? How'd you find out about it?"

A dramatic sigh passed through her lips before she said, "It always hurts me when you think I don't find out about anything and everything."

"That guy from HR?" he asked with a grin.

"Duh." She took a drink. "So spill."

"It's just a temp assignment to setup a policy division in New York."

"Sounds like a load of responsibility."

"Yea, the first person they offered it to turned it down."

"Hmm…wonder who that was."

"Don't know everything I see."

"Shut up," she said with a grin. "Are you gonna take it?"

"Don't know," he said with a shrug. "I'd have to uproot my life for at least half a year, though it's not like I have much of a life."

"Well, just so you know if you do take the offer, I'll miss you."

"Well, I'll miss you bugging me while I'm trying to work."

"No you won't," she said with a laugh.

Their waitress walked by to remind them that happy hour was almost over and, since their glasses were almost empty, they ordered their last half-priced drinks of the day.

"So, what'd you think of Quinn's boyfriend?" Heather asked as Mike finished his last mouthful of Yuengling which he almost spat back out.

After he finally got the last of his beer down, he asked, "What new boyfriend?"

"She hasn't told you?"

"We haven't really been talking."

Heather pursed her lips and fell silent, not something he was used to.

"How long have they been going out?"

Again, Heather did something he wasn't used to and squirmed in her seat before she answered his question that he didn't really want to know the answer to.

"Almost a month now."

This bit of news made sense since Quinn had stopped coming over for movie nights about a month ago. Not that he was counting the days or anything.

It also made his decision much easier.

XXX

Another weekly status meeting finished, the trio of policy analysts walked back to their respective work areas. Even when Quinn had been coming over to his place and eating lunch with him regularly, she still put her work above all else when they were at the office, so Heather and Mike were usually left talking to each other. It just got worse now that Quinn wasn't really talking with him, so it surprised him when she touched his arm and asked to speak with him in her office.

"You're taking the job?" Quinn asked after he closed the door.

"Yea, probably," he said, unsurprised that Quinn knew since her network was almost as good as Heather's. She just didn't use it very often. "Just working out some of the final details."

"This…this isn't because of me is it?"

Of course it was about her, but there wasn't any way he could say that as he stared at her. So, he lied.

"No, it's a great opportunity. I couldn't pass it up."

"Oh." Her head dropped for a moment. "I'm happy for you."

"Thanks, but it's nothing special. Go to New York for a few months, boss some people around, then come back." And if he was lucky, he'd be over her.

"I guess we should hang out as much as we can before you go," she said after a few seconds of awkward silence.

"Yea, we should."

They never did.


	6. Chapter 6

Quinn Fabray's life hadn't gone according to plan. Lucy Caboosey led to an early trip under the knife and a new life in a new town which led to the complete mess that was high school. It wasn't until she applied to Yale on a whim and the acceptance letter came that she began to believe in herself again. With her grades and extracurricular activities, Ohio State was a lock but it wouldn't have felt like an accomplishment, just something expected of her like everything else in her life. On the other hand, the mere name of an Ivy League school opened doors for her that she wouldn't have been able to even knock on if she went to her state school.

Even with everything she had been through, she didn't feel sorry for herself for anything that happened to her or regret anything that she did. Instead of being a real estate agent back in Lima, she ended up living and working in the most powerful city in the free world. She had nothing to regret. Except for Beth of course, but even that had worked itself out in the end.

Most of the things in her life had fallen into place as well: She had a well-paying job she was good at in a career she enjoyed; she owned the condo, and the attached low-rate mortgage, she was living in; she had a nice set of friends, old and new; and a really nice boyfriend who really cared about her.

Everything a girl could want.

XXX

"Hey," Heather said as she poked her head into Quinn's office, "how's that report coming?"

Quinn didn't bother with looking over from her computer monitor as she said, "Should be done soon," which she hoped Heather would take as a hint to leave her to her work. She had no such luck as Heather slid into her office and took a seat.

"I can't believe how much work we have to do now," Heather said while grabbing a pen from Quinn's penholder.

After almost two years of peaceful bliss during work, Quinn had forgotten just how chatty Heather could be, but she could mostly ignore her and get through a conversation by using various forms of the word "yes." What she couldn't ignore was her pen flying through the air as Heather began to flick it up towards the ceiling. Part of her wondered how the woman sitting across from her, mindlessly tossing a pen up in the air, had been sorority president and valedictorian of her class, but Heather was one of the smartest people she had known.

"Don't you have work to do?"

"Not really, almost done with all of it."

Like she said, one of the smartest. And sometimes it frustrated her to know she wasn't the best at what she did.

After a few more minutes of futilely trying to work Quinn looked over and said, "Could you stop doing that?"

"Doing what?" Heather glanced over at Quinn, causing the pen to drop. "Oh, sorry."

While Heather ducked down to pick up the pen, Quinn sighed and rubbed her eyes. Heather was right. Now that the trio was reduced to two, their workload had almost doubled but sometimes it felt as though she was doing three or four times the work. Not to mention she lost the person who turned the few dull parts of the job into her favorite times of the day from her own stupidity.

When Quinn opened her eyes, she found Heather staring right at her and saying, "Have you talked to Mike recently?"

This was not what she wanted to talk about now.

"No, haven't had the chance."

"I wonder how he's doing."

"You could talk to him."

"Nah, we're work buddies. It'd feel strange if I talked to him out of the blue."

"I'm sure he'd be glad to hear from you."

Heather shrugged then returned the pen back to its proper place as she said, "You should probably talk to James about hiring someone new."

"Why? Mike will be back in a few months."

Heather gave her a look she couldn't read before saying, "Right. I'll let you get back to work."

XXX

"Here, let me get that for you," Chris said as he pulled Quinn's chair out at the restaurant they were at for dinner.

"Thank you," she said as she took her seat.

Chris was the nicest boyfriend Quinn had ever had and that was saying something since she stopped putting up with anyone who treated her poorly. Life was too short to keep assholes around. And Chris was the furthest from being an asshole as someone could be.

Flower bouquets would randomly show up at work. Texts that said he was thinking about her made her phone chime. When they were together, no door would go unopened and no seat would remain unpulled. No one had ever made her feel as pampered as Chris did, even if it felt like he wouldn't let her do either of those things for herself even if she asked to.

"How do you seem to know about every amazing restaurant in the city?" Chris asked as he looked through the menu.

The only menu Quinn need to look at was the wine list and she gave a waiter her bottle selection before she answered him.

"I have a…friend who enjoys food as much as I do, so we eat at a lot of places."

"Oh?" Chris glanced up from the menu. "Am I going to meet this friend?"

"No, he's up in New York now."

"That's too bad," Chris said as he closed his menu. "I think I'll get the chicken."

_Always chicken_, she thought. Not that there was anything wrong with chicken itself, but she couldn't help but think how unadventurous he was compared to the last person she ate here with.

She missed being able to try a bite or two or more of something she wouldn't want an entire plate of. She missed sharing her own food with someone who appreciated it. She missed the way his voice would rise in tone and speed up as he read out a combination of ingredients that grabbed him. She missed seeing the stupid grin on his face after the first bite of some incredible dish. She missed the way he had something clever or insightful or funny to say as they jumped from topic to topic. Thankfully, the wine arrived at their table before she could think of any more things she missed.

She drank much more than she should have that night, more than she had for a long time. Chris gladly escorted her home and left her on her doorstep with a kiss on the cheek which they were both fine with. He wanted to save himself until marriage and she hadn't felt like being intimate with anyone for a while.

Tossing and turning, she tried, and failed, to fall asleep even though alcohol had went from turning her into an angry drunk to just a sleepy one. A symptom of getting old along with nothing much to be angry about anymore, she supposed. She let out a groan and reached for her phone to check how long she had been not asleep which turned out to be a little over two hours, just long enough for a headache to begin. But not nearly enough to stop her from doing something reckless.

Her fingers slowly moved along the screen of her phone as she texted Mike, making sure she spelled her message correctly.

_Hi_

It didn't help her efforts at sleeping that she mindlessly stared at her phone waiting for him to respond which she didn't expect him to since it was close to one in the morning. That didn't stop her from continuing to write though.

_I know you're probably asleep and we really haven't talked much, but I just wanted to say hi_

Having a one-sided conversation with her phone while half-drunk and tired proved to be harder than she imagined. As she searched for something to write, the phone buzzed, startling her and causing it to drop right on her face.

It was a text from Mike that simply said, _Hi_

_You're awake_

_I'm awake_

She smiled for no reason and wrote, _I'm a little drunk_

_I can see that_

_I wanted to say hi_

_You said that already_

_I hate you_

His reply took a while to arrive and, as she wondered what was taking so long, her phone vibrated.

_I know_

She sat up and stared at his response, wishing that they were actually face to face so he could see she was joking. So she could see that he was in on the joke.

_I don't actually hate you_

This time his response came much faster.

_I know_

A wave of relief crashed over her as she fell back onto her bed which was followed by a wave of exhaustion.

_I'm sleepy_, she wrote as she rolled over on her side, barely able to keep her eyes open.

_I am too, we should go to sleep_

_We should. Night_

Mike sent back the same word in reply and Quinn felt happy, happier than she had felt in a long time. Before she drifted off to sleep, she texted him one more time saying, _I miss you_

_I miss you too_

She fell asleep with her phone on her pillow and a smile on her face.

XXX

Quinn stared at her useless computer as she drummed her fingers on her desk with one hand and twirled a pencil with the other. With every passing second, she could feel the work she had to finish by today piling up which meant another long workday in another long workweek in another long work-month.

Every piece of enterprise software promised an uptime of 99.X% with a varying number of nines in place of the X. In other words, no software could, or would, ever guarantee 100% uptime which meant there would be times when things went down. Patton Boggs had hit the jackpot. The company intranet, email, and document servers had all grounded to a halt as she came back from lunch, bringing all work to a stop.

The Internet could still be accessed for some mind-boggling reason.

Just as Quinn decided slip her heels back on and go out for a walk, Heather strolled into her office, sat down, and said, "Network's down."

"I noticed."

"Bad timing."

"Sure is."

"Staying late today?"

"Yea, probably," Quinn said with a sigh. "You?"

Heather returned the sigh before saying, "Yea. It's killing my social life."

They sat there commiserating over the increased workload. Or at least Heather did while Quinn scanned her Twitter then Facebook feed. She didn't use either very much, with Facebook for updates on people she cared about to varying degrees and Twitter being relegated to feeding her breaking news. Today, nothing interesting seemed to be happening in the world as her Twitter feed was filled with stories rehashing yesterday's news.

The second post on Facebook brought the pencil flying between her fingers to a standstill.

Mike had been tagged in a photo taken by Rachel Berry, which wasn't surprising since Rachel was the one person who would reconnect and hang out with someone she knew in high school just because they were in the same town. Quinn couldn't say the same thing about herself. If Mike hadn't taken the job here at Patton Boggs, she would have grabbed lunch with him one day to say hello and that would've been it. She wouldn't have made the best friend she had ever known.

Not that she didn't ruin the relationship anyway, but that wasn't new for her.

Part of her mind could feel the pencil in her hand bending as she gripped it and placed more and more pressure on the exposed part with her thumb. The rest of her mind was focused on the pretty face attached to the pair of lips attached to the cheek of Mike's smiling face. Rachel had helpfully taken and tagged many more photos of their night out on the town so Quinn could see just how beautiful this brunette was and how much fun they were having.

Annoyingly, Facebook wouldn't even tell her the name of the woman.

"What'cha looking at?"

That was another thing about Heather that annoyed Quinn; the woman was much too perceptive.

"Facebook."

"Anything interesting?"

The one good thing about Heather's questions was that it kept Quinn from snatching up her phone and demanding that Rachel tell her who the woman was. She wasn't supposed to care anymore. The feelings were supposed to go away. It wasn't her primary reason for pulling away from him, but it counted as point 1B at the very least.

"No, nothing interesting."

XXX

Quinn's preferred morning drink was tea which she brewed every morning after getting in. She found it to have the same deep and complex flavors that good coffee had, only more soothing and calming. What she loved most, though, was the actual brewing of the tea. She had done it so often, the motions were ingrained into her muscle memory like cheerleading once was. This allowed her the quiet time to mentally organize and prepare for what she needed to do for the day.

This was what she was doing as she walked back to her office with her teapot in one hand and an outline of a paper running through her head. She pulled up short of her office when she saw Heather standing with a woman with a Patton Boggs welcome packet under his arm outside of Mike's cubicle.

It was silly and something she worked on, but any disruption during this routine could throw Quinn off for the entire morning and the scene in front of her definitely counted as a disruption. It took a second before she found her legs again and walked up to the pair.

"—your cubicle. If you've got any questions, let me know."

If where they were standing and the welcome packet weren't enough of a hint then overhearing the end of Heather's welcome speech was all Quinn needed to know.

"What's going on?"

The question came out harsher than Quinn wanted and she could see the new woman opposite to her flinch.

Heather just grinned and said, "Quinn, this is Charlotte. She's one of the new interns. Charlotte, this is Quinn. She's someone you don't wanna mess with."

Quinn rolled her eyes. "That's Mike's cubicle."

"He's not here," Heather said with a smirk, "and there's nowhere else to put her."

"She's an intern. There's no way she's getting the largest cubicle in the section."

Heather shrugged and said, "Can't do anything about it."

"She's not taking the cubicle. I'll find a place for her."

XXX

The second time someone tried to take Mike's cubicle, it wasn't some summer intern but a paralegal with years of service time with the firm.

All Quinn had to say to him was, "Not happening."

The paralegal tried to put up a fight, but there was no way Mike was going to be shunted off to some closet of a cubicle on a lower floor while she was around. For one, they needed him to be around because it made their jobs easier if they were close together. For another, Quinn wanted him around because she just did and there was no point in denying it any longer.

XXX

Breaking up with Chris made her feel terrible. Not because she wanted to stay together, but because she knew she had used him. She knew what it felt like and no one deserved to be used. Not her, not Chris, and not Mike.

Yes, she had used Mike and lied to herself, and him, about it. His friendship meant so much to her that she wanted to keep it no matter what, even though she had started to think of him as more than a friend and it was obvious that he had as well. She thought if she ignored her feelings that they would go away and she would be able to move on while keeping their friendship intact. Mike would see that and move on as well.

Neither of those had happened for her, but Mike had literally moved on by moving away. After playing back their final encounters, she no longer believed his statement that she wasn't the reason for him taking the job. When he got back she would tell him the truth and hope for the best. If the steady stream of photos on Facebook and the short messages she got back when she tried to have a conversation with him were any indication, the best thing she could hope for was some form of friendship.

XXX

The third time she stopped someone from taking Mike's cubicle, James called her into his office to speak with her. She explained her position to him, minus the whole wanting Mike to be close because she wanted to be close to him thing. Somehow, she didn't think that would be a valid reason for the cubicle to remain empty. James said he understood but that the next person would be taking the cubicle and there wasn't anything she could do about it.

Fuming over this, she sat in front of her computer for the rest of the morning and hammered away at the keyboard. Apparently, anger was a great motivator and she finished almost all of the work she had planned to do for the day by lunch. It remained to be seen if the quality of the work was any good. It wasn't, so she spent the rest of the day fixing what she had written in the morning, frustrating her even more.

So she was none too amused when Heather walked into her office and said, "I hear you and James had a nice little chat this morning."

"It doesn't matter. I'll throw whoever's in there out when Mike gets back."

Heather took a seat then asked, "How do you know he's coming back?"

"Why wouldn't he come back?"

"Nothing for him to come back to," Heather said as she stared right at Quinn, almost causing the blonde to squirm under the gaze. Quinn was much more used to giving, and not receiving, those stares.

"He'll come back," Quinn said with a quickly fading confidence.

"No. He won't," Heather said slowly.

The firmness of Heather's reply shattered what little confidence Quinn had left. "Wha—What'd you mean?"

"They're gonna need someone to head up their new policy division and who better to do it than the guy who set it up?"

Quinn's hands froze on her keyboard as she processed the response. She hadn't thought of what would happen in New York after Mike was finished. All she was doing was counting down the days until Mike would be back. Not that she even knew the exact date he'd be back. She just assumed that he would be back when the job was done and the notion of him not coming back hadn't even entered her mind until that moment. But it was all she could think about now that it had.

XXX

Quinn looked down at herself and made sure everything was in its place. She hadn't been the type of person who had to have every fold of clothing just right and every strand of hair perfectly coifed before going out in public since being a high school cheerleader. That's not to say she didn't try to look nice when she left her house. It's just that she no longer felt the need to be seen as some sort of perfect being.

Today was different. Today, she wanted to look perfect and, with her favorite dress, shoes, and scarf on, she did. A final check in her mirror confirmed this.

The plan she came up with was the most impulsive thing she had done in decades. Ever since she graduated from high school she decided that she needed to weigh the pros and cons of every decision she made. Living through those events made her realize that her actions and decisions had consequences that affected her life and the lives of the people around her. She couldn't and wouldn't do anything without thinking it through.

Her hand came up in a loose fist and she noticed that her fingers were trembling from either excitement or terror. She couldn't decide which it was, but it was probably a bit of both. It didn't matter though. She was here and there was no turning back.

She rapped on the door in front of her with her knuckles and waited patiently, trying not to rock on her feet.

Nothing happened, so she knocked again, harder this time. After a few seconds, the door opened and she heard a familiar voice say, "You're here early."

Her excitement over seeing Mike again was quickly replaced by shock as she stared at his naked torso and those spectacular abs that Tina had gone on and on about back in high school. Apparently, dancing was more than enough for him to maintain them. She couldn't pull her eyes away from his abs and felt a warmth begin to spread out from the pit of her stomach.

"Quinn?"

She jerked her head up and could feel her cheeks flushing as Mike looked at her in confusion. After taking a few breaths to calm herself and trying to get some moisture in her mouth, she said, "Hi."

"What're you doing here?"

This was the problem with doing something impulsive. She hadn't had the time to think through all of the parts of her plan and this was one of the things that she couldn't come up with a solution for. All she could do was hope that Mike would listen to her and that required her to say something.

"I wanted to surprise you."

"Um," he said as his eyes danced around, looking at anything but her, "well, I'm definitely surprised to see you." Finally, his eyes settled on her. "I guess you should come in."

He stepped aside to let Quinn in and only then did she notice that his lower half was almost as undressed as his upper body. That warmth began creeping out from her stomach again, making her annoyed at her own body since now was not the time to get excited. It would help if Mike would put on some more clothes.

"I'm, uh, gonna put on some clothes," Mike said as he walked into what she assumed to be his bedroom.

Things would be so much easier if all her thoughts would become reality like they just did.

Quinn looked around his new apartment for the first time and grinned since it looked a lot like the one she had spent so much time in. It wasn't that everything was in the same place because it couldn't be; there just wasn't enough room. Even though the apartment was smaller, it had that same lived-in feeling that his messiness seemed to bring. She wondered how this apartment could feel so warm even though he'd only been living in it for a few months while hers felt nothing like it after being lived in for years.

The more she looked around though, the more things she saw that weren't the same: An expensive looking bicycle hung from a hook behind the door. The shelf where his television sat lacked the line of Blu-rays she knew he owned. A pyramid of Chinese takeout boxes was stacked on top of pizza boxes on top of the living room table. The kitchen, on the other hand, looked completely unused.

What she needed now was a glass of water, but that was another thing that had changed. She didn't know where anything was and she didn't want to be found rifling through his kitchen. Mike would believe her story, or at least she thought he would, but she still didn't want any thought of her being a crazy woman to be in his head. She sat down on the sofa instead and immediately stood up when Mike came back out.

"Hey," Mike said, dressed in an undershirt and nice pair of jeans, "so why are you here? Not that I mind or anything."

"I came up to visit a friend and decided to come by."

Mike closed his eyes for a second before saying, "How'd you even find my address?"

"Your address is listed with the company so—"

"That guy in HR?"

Quinn grinned. "Yea."

Mike groaned and shook his head. "So…aside from turning into a stalker—"

"Hey!"

"—what've you been up to?"

"Um, not much." She scuffed a shoe against the rug under his living room table a few times. "I see you got a bike."

"Yea, it's a nice way of getting to work and exercising at the same time."

"Good… Good." Her shoe scuffed the rug a few more times. "May I have a glass of water?"

Mike gave her a funny look before bringing her a glass of water which she took a long drink from before she said, "I broke up with Chris."

Blinking eyes were the only response she got for a few seconds before he said, "Sorry about that. He seemed like a great guy."

"It's okay. I'm okay." She took a breath and looked up at him. "I realized that I was lying to myself and wanted to be with someone else."

His mouth flopped open and barely moved when he said, "Oh."

He opened his mouth to say more but knocking on the door interrupted him. Turning too fast for her to see his reaction to the interruption, he went over to the door and opened it.

She wasn't surprised when a short brunette walked in, saw her, and screamed, "Quinn!" It also wasn't surprising when the brunette ran over and hugged her.

"Rachel, how are you?"

"Wonderful, now that you're here," Rachel said as she pulled away slightly. "We haven't seen each other in forever."

"I know, but that's what this trip is for."

Rachel pulled back even more and said, "Oh, I love this scarf."

"I'm, uh, going to finish getting ready," Mike said. "You two ladies can catch up."

The two ladies glanced over at Mike before Rachel continued, "Where'd you get it?"

"I bought a few while they were on sale at Nordstrom."

"They're amazing. I—," Rachel began to say, but when Mike walked out of earshot she pulled Quinn to the front of the apartment and switched to a furious whisper. "What are you doing here?"

"I know I wasn't—"

"The plan was to surprise him at dinner. Not pop up at his apartment like a stalker."

"I know. I know, but—"

"You're acting like I did back in high school."

Quinn rolled her eyes then said, "Nice acting back there."

Now it was Rachel's turn to roll her eyes. "Who do you think you're talking to?"

"Thanks for doing this," Quinn said after a moment with a smile.

Rachel returned the smile and said, "Couldn't wait to see him, huh?"

"No. I don't think I've ever been happier in my life than when he opened the door."

"Well," Rachel said as she tucked herself under Quinn's arm like the sister she had turned into during their time in college, "we'll see if we can make you happier this weekend. Our plan should still work even with this detour."

"Stop calling it a plan."

Mike came out a second later before Rachel could respond to Quinn, but she did say, "Mike! Quinn's coming to dinner with us!"

"She is?" Quinn couldn't tell if he was happy about it or not. "Are we gonna be able to fit her in the reservation?"

"Yea, I called the restaurant and they said it was fine."

"Oh, that's great then."

She still couldn't figure out if the idea of her coming along made him happy.

XXX

The plan, according to Rachel, was to have Quinn surprise Mike by showing up at dinner unannounced, make a declaration of love which Mike would return, and then they would live happily ever after. Preferably in New York.

Rachel had never lost her romantic streak which was one of the reasons Quinn loved her, but the chances of that plan happening were about as good as Quinn spontaneously turning into a duck. All she wanted to do was tell Mike the truth and hope for the best. She couldn't, and wouldn't, expect anything more which was why she talked mostly with Rachel as they made their way to the restaurant. There was an entire weekend available to her and the streets of New York were not the place to have the conversation.

As the restaurant came into view, Quinn saw the one major problem with this plan standing next to Finn. This dinner was originally supposed to be a way for Rachel to introduce Mike to one of her theatre friends. That idea had been tossed out the window when Quinn called and explained what she wanted to do. Thankfully, Rachel was being sneaky about it and, combined with a few last second invites, neither of the two knew what the dinner was supposed to be for.

That solved one thing. The larger problem was the fact that Rachel thought her friend would be a good match for Mike. Quinn had no reason to think Rachel was wrong. All she could think about was them hitting it off and Mike completely forgetting about her, even though Rachel promised she would make sure her friend would end up far away from Mike. Plus, Rachel had been downplaying her friend every day, but that turned out to be a bunch of lies.

"You didn't tell me she was a fucking supermodel," Quinn said after she dragged Rachel away from the group.

"She's not a supermodel. She's an actor on Broadway and she's just…tall and beautiful and…" Rachel grinned before continuing, "Dresses like a model."

"You're not helping."

"Stop worrying. You do what you need to do and I'll make sure they don't interact much."

Rachel did just that, but Quinn didn't talk with Mike as much as she would've liked since he wouldn't keep a conversation going with her, not matter how hard she tried. Most of her time was spent glancing at him and being reminded of the little things, like the way he dropped his nose close to his food and took a deep breath as he always did. Or how he closed his eyes to savor the first bite of his dish. Or the way he laughed at the dumbest comments.

Before she knew it, they had split off into smaller groups after dinner. Half the group, including the supermodel, decided they were still young and went bar hopping. The other half, comprised of the people she knew, felt way too old to be doing that and made their way to a subway station. She didn't know if Rachel and Finn actually felt that way or if Rachel heard Mike decide to head home. In either case, Quinn was thankful that someone would be there if Mike still wouldn't talk to her.

"So, dinner was nice," Quinn said, as Rachel and Finn sped off arm in arm ahead of them. That she knew was on purpose.

"Yea, it was."

Again with the short responses.

"I really liked the sweetbreads."

Mike chuckled. "I still can't believe that's the only offal you like."

"I know," she said, smiling that she made him laugh. "It's crazy."

"Did you see the look on Rachel's face when you explained what they are?"

"I did," she said, now with a full-blown grin. "It looked like she was going to throw up. Or cry."

"Probably both," he said drawing laughter from both of them.

They took half a dozen steps before he said, "They looked good."

"I would've given you a bite," she said, glancing over at him.

He glanced back and smiled. "I know."

If it wouldn't have been entirely creepy, Quinn would've taken her phone out and snapped a picture of that smile to keep forever. Instead, all she did was smile back and then look away. Every so often she would glance over at him and catch him looking at her. It made her want to skip down the street and scream with joy.

"So, how do you like New York?"

"It's fine," Mike said with a shrug. "Just different."

"The restaurants are great here right?"

"Yea, but…"

She waited a beat before saying, "But?"

"I don't really know anyone who loves food here and—" He stopped talking as he looked straight ahead "Hold on a second."

Mike ran off ahead, dodging past Rachel and Finn, as Quinn watched, completely confused. The pair ahead of her looked back and she just shrugged while walking faster to catch up. They watched as Mike dodged past a few more people until he reached a subway station half a block ahead of them. There a woman stood at the top of the stairs with the handle of a stroller in one hand and holding onto the hand of a child in the other.

The warmth in her stomach came back again. This time because of the ticking biological time bomb called her ovaries as she watched Mike making faces at the baby in the stroller as he helped carry it down the stairs. It was ridiculous how something like that could be turning her on. Biology and evolution were stupid.

"He's really great isn't he?" Rachel said as they stopped at the top of the stairs and watched.

"He is."

Even with Mike's help, it was a struggle to get the stroller and child down the stairs. Understandably, the mother didn't want to jostle the baby in the stroller or let go of the child who was making his own unsteady way down the stairs. Quinn excused herself and quickly caught up to them.

"Excuse me." Mike and the mother looked up at her. "Can I help?"

"Oh my god," the mother said. "Thank you so much."

Mike made another face at the baby, drawing a few giggles, before saying, "Hey, I got this."

"No offense," Quinn said with a smile. "But it looked like the big strapping young man was having some trouble."

This brought a smile to his face and, with Quinn's help on the stroller, they quickly made their way down the stairs to the fare gates. Beyond them there was another set of stairs to reach the platform and Mike just shrugged when she looked at him. He pushed the stroller through the gate and passed his fare card back to Quinn so she could use it. They carried the stroller down the second set of stairs and accepted the mother's many thanks.

"Do you two have kids?" the mother asked as they stood on the platform and a train pulled up.

"We aren't—" Mike and Quinn began to say at the same time.

"Think about it. You two would make great parents," the mother said, making her way onto the train. She thanked them again before the doors closed. That left Mike and Quinn standing there watching it pull away, ignoring the comment hanging in the air.

"The subway always makes me miss the Metro. Escalators. Elevators." He sniffed the air a few times. "And no funny smells."

Quinn laughed as they began making their way back up the stairs. "C'mon, let's get back."

She stopped when she felt a hand on her forearm and spun around, seeing Mike at eye-level since he was step or two below her. There was a funny look on his face as he held up his phone.

"Rachel and Finn were exhausted and went home first."

Struggling to keep a blank face, she silently thanked Rachel and said, "Oh."

"I guess I'll take you back to your hotel. Where are you staying?"

"The Algonquin, by Times Square."

Mike looked up at the sign above them for a few seconds then said, "We can take a train from this station."

The train ride back to her hotel was a quiet affair as they were both tired, Mike from a day of work and Quinn crashing from an adrenaline high. It took all she had not to drop her head against his chest as they stood pressed together in the crowded train, swaying along with the rest of the people. Two transfers in the subway and a short walk later and they were standing in front of her hotel looking at each other.

It didn't take too long for the moment to turn awkward with Mike looking around and Quinn gripping one of her elbows. Just for something to do, she said, "Thanks for walking me back."

"Don't worry about it."

"Reminds you of old times, doesn't it?"

"Yea, it does."

They fell silent and the awkwardness grew back with each passing second. Too bad it wasn't a physical object so she could glare at it until it went away. She settled by saying, "Do you want to grab a drink at the bar?"

"I think I'm gonna go. I'm—"

"Just one drink. I need to tell you something."

She stared at him with those piercing eyes of hers. They had always been helpful with getting things from other people and she hoped they wouldn't let her down now.

"Fine," he said as held up a finger. "One drink."

XXX

"So, what'd you want to talk about?"

Quinn took a sip of her wine, set the glass down, and said, "I wanted to say I'm sorry."

"What for?"

She took another sip. "I really, really liked— like you Mike, but I didn't do anything about it out of some perverse belief that I was protecting you."

"And how exactly were you doing that?"

"I stink at relationships." She looked down at her hands. "I've ruined every single one I've been in starting with my best friend back in middle school who I stabbed in the back to impress the popular kids all the way to Chris who I used to try and get over you."

"Quinn—"

"I'm an awful person and—"

Mike interrupted her with laughter. _Laughter_. He was actually laughing at her and it was all she could do to not slap him across the face while saying, "I bare my soul to you and you laugh in my face?"

"No. I'm not— It's just that—" He closed his eyes and took a deep breath. "This is your plan?"

Her eyes blinked a few times as her anger was pushed out of the way by confusion. "You heard us talking?"

"Thin walls," he said with a smile. "And I thought Rachel said something about a love confession. Not…that."

She rolled her eyes. "That was Rachel being a romantic and making up a story of how this would go in her mind."

"You'd say 'I love you' then I'd say it back then we'd live happily ever after?"

Quinn laughed and Mike joined her after she said, "In New York of course."

Out of everything she missed about Mike, laughter was the biggest, and it felt good to laugh with him again. The happiness from seeing him was one thing, but what she got from interacting with him was so much better.

After their laughs died down Mike stared at her and said, "Rachel was right. Minus the whole New York thing."

She stared back blankly, not quite able to process what he had said.

"But, that means— I don't want to hurt you."

"I know you don't and that's the important thing."

"But—"

"Listen," he said as he grabbed her hand. "The fact that you don't want to hurt the people you care about makes you not an awful person."

The warmth from his hands felt really nice and she looked down while stroking the back of one of them with her thumb. "But I always end up hurting them."

"It happens."

She covered his hands with her other and squeezed. "I don't want to hurt you."

"Too late for that." She looked up and he had a wry smile on his face. "But things like that happen when you make progress."

It took a moment to catch his reference but when she did, she smirked and said, "You and your Stanford wisdom."

They sat there, hands intertwined, just looking at each other. She felt giddy which was why her yawn caught her by surprise which caused Mike to yawn which caused both of them to laugh.

"I think we're done with our drinks."

"Yea," she said, dropping her head back against the booth and closing her eyes. Only to open them when she felt him pull his hands away.

"I think I'm gonna go."

She watched him as he pulled out his wallet and dropped enough money to cover their tab. Her mind was made up before he extended his hand to help her out of her seat.

"Mike," she said, pulling him to a stop. "Come upstairs."

When his answer didn't come immediately, she had the ridiculous feeling that he would reject her, even though they just had that entire conversation. Not that they had come to an actual decision with all that talking.

"Don't you think we should wait? Or talk some more?"

"No," she said as she pulled him into the lobby of the hotel. "We've done enough of both."


End file.
